To activate its partnerships with Roland Garros and Wimbledon, global technology and mobile company OPPO, created a 360-degree, multi-stage global campaign running through June and July which boosted brand and partnership awareness, highlighted key products and aimed to inspire the next generation of tennis fans.
Created in harness with agency Sid Lee, the twin-tournament activation sought to leverage its flagship tennis partnerships by highlighting the mutually inspirational player-fan relationship: a strategy which sought to echo ‘OPPO’s own pursuit of technological advancements to meet and exceed its users’ needs and its new ‘Inspiration Ahead’ brand proposition.
The campaign spans TV, press, outdoor, digital, and social channels, as well as at-event and on-court initiatives.
The centrepiece of the ‘Inspiration Ahead’ campaign is a hero film featuring WTA professional player Francesca Jones who, despite being born with ectrodactyly ectodermal dysplasia syndrome (a rare condition that causes developmental problems for hands and feet), has worked hard to overcome adversity and rise through the ranks in recent years.
The ‘Inspiration Ahead’ hero spot dropped on 4 July and tells a story about how she inspires a young promising player, transitioning between Francesca playing on clay (Roland Garros) and a young girl playing on grass (Wimbledon). The young girl watches footage of Francesca using her OPPO Find X5 Pro smartphone and replicates the pro’s movements as she practices: highlighting moments of frustration, difficulty and success before the final scene sees the camera zoom out to show the inspired young girl is in the crowd filming with the 4K Ultra Night Video mode of her OPPO Find X5 smartphone.
This centrepiece was supported by parallel sets of additional activations for the two tournaments.
For example, at the recent French Open OPPO and Sid Lee created an activation championing the 4K Ultra Night Video technology and the 5-Axis Optical Image stabilisation (which uses long exposure to create stunning visuals) by teaming up with renowned light painting photographer LightGraff. This initiative saw fans’ good luck messages for their favourite players used to create light painting visuals amplified on OPPO’s social channels using the campaign hashtags #InspirationAhead and #PaintTheNight.
Fans not in attendance could also participate thanks to a light painting Instagram filter, allowing users to create their very own light painting masterpieces.
We want YOU to bring #InspirationAhead to life!
Learn how to #PaintTheNight with the #OPPOFindX5Pro – we'd love for you to share your works of art with us when you do #OPPOTennisSeason pic.twitter.com/Dn3uLBi2f5
— OPPO (@oppo) May 30, 2022
The magic of @rolandgarros lit up our nights✨
In return, we lit up the iconic court by light painting inspiring words for players submitted by @SheonathS and Camilleraready(IG)
To @RafaelNadal and @iga_swiatek, and all who took part, here's to more #InspirationAhead. pic.twitter.com/AOFBSTQrQY
— OPPO (@oppo) June 6, 2022
My heart and Mind is my favourite player to paint to night like never before you touch .
catch the #oppoFindX5Pro go when meet @oppo and Night there only show magic of paint Night
Love you @oppo#InspirationAhead #oppoFindX5Pro
#PaintTheNight
#PaintTheNight pic.twitter.com/zQscfJKbjL— gulshan swami (@gulshanswami2) May 25, 2022
Let's play in the dark and paint the night with our favorite colour #InspirationAhead #OPPOFindX5Pro5G #PaintTheNight #OppoEncoX2 @oppo https://t.co/s3ZtABZ0vl
— Lady Gordons (@HerQueenGirl) May 26, 2022
Capturing greatness, multiple frames at a time.#OPPOMotion #ShotonOPPO pic.twitter.com/kyNo0wwOV6
— OPPO (@oppo) June 22, 2022
Up for a challenge?
Name the players by listening to these sounds (and other clues) for your chance to win some @rolandgarros merch! #OPPOTennisSeason #InspirationAhead
Player A:
Player B:— OPPO (@oppo) June 2, 2022
@RafaelNadal with the perfect angle!
Check out our Shot of the Day by @oppo#RolandGarros | #InspirationAhead pic.twitter.com/ypY1YNdaU1
— Roland-Garros (@rolandgarros) June 3, 2022
The past few days of #RolandGarros were memorable
Let's have a look back with the #OPPOFindX5Pro #InspirationAhead #OPPOTennisSeason pic.twitter.com/CbetnNjMNR— OPPO (@oppo) June 13, 2022
While at Wimbledon, the inspirational player/fan relationship was brought to life via an AR activation celebrating 100 years of Centre Court. Featuring 40 different past Wimbledon Champions – from Billy Jean King to Roger Federer – users can select four Champions from each decade with a video telling the story of that era.
The short videos share inspirational content of the Champions playing on Wimbledon’s much-celebrated Centre Court, while a set of iconic Wimbledon objects – from strawberries and cream to Rufus the Hawk – are animated in 3D to enrich the experience and users can take photos with the Champions to share on social media.
There was also a pre-tournament ticket contest rolling out from mid-June to win tickets to the men’s final as well as 100 of other prizes promoted via digital and social content and entered via https://gleam.io/xBJe9/wimbledon-x-oppo
Other content within the umbrella activation programme included an ‘OPPO x Wimbledon 2022 | All in the Detail’ spot posted on the brand’s own channels from 24 June, a #ShotOnOppo social series, the Oppo Breakthrough Inspiration Award, Oppo ambassadors social content, live screenings and a celebrity-fronted ‘Sam & Bash’ online video series.
There's gold behind these gates #ColoursOfWimbledon | #ShotonOPPO | @oppo pic.twitter.com/d5l1BTFE8k
— Wimbledon (@Wimbledon) July 10, 2022
To this year's other nominees, congratulations on a memorable Championships#Wimbledon | @oppo pic.twitter.com/0CztMz1d29
— Wimbledon (@Wimbledon) July 8, 2022
A day in the life of our #OPPOAmbassadors, as they explore #Wimbldeon2022
Which snap is your favorite?#OPPOTennisSeason #CapturingInspiration pic.twitter.com/uAg7YDm1go— OPPO (@oppo) July 8, 2022
Get ready to serve for our #OPPOMotion Tennis Contest!
Capture tennis in motion (we'll let you decide how to interpret that) to win @Wimbledon LOGO caps and tote bags! #ShotonOPPO #Wimbledon
June 20th – 27th, 2022 ⏳ pic.twitter.com/651nRPaCNc— OPPO (@oppo) June 20, 2022
In London between 30th June and 2nd July? This is pretty cool. ‘@OPPOMobileUK Presents: @Oppo Wimbledon Live Screening by the Thames’ – 200 spaces per day are available to access the VIP area, and there will be actual Wimbledon tickets to be won too! https://t.co/pbcRk2XEz8
— Paul O'Brien (@PaulOBrien) June 20, 2022
The activation closed on 11 July at the end of The Championships with a ‘So…What’s Next?’ spot neatly linking its tennis partnerships to its football sponsorships.
The campaign was led by a team at OPPO which included Project Leads Zhang Gaoxiang and Zhi Shuang Shuang, Creative Leads Mats Hakansson and Yuyeon Cho-De Jong, PR Yan Su and Digital Managers Zhang Qinglang and Chen Xinyi.
The group working on the project at agency Sid Lee was led by CCO Europe Sylvain Thirache, President Johan Delpuech, Creative Lead Sofia Lyu, Business Directors Eugénie Valletoux and Gareth Hall, Senior Project Manager Sam Bridgwater, Copywriter Jillian Young, Social Media Manager Cassandre Geron, plus Producers Laetitia Neves and Aurelia Blatry.
Comment
The 2022 French Open ran from 16 May to 5 June while Wimbledon took place between 27 June and 10 July.
OPPO first became the official global smartphone partner of The Championships, Wimbledon back in 2019, while it also renewed its partnership with the French Tennis Federation in April 2022 extending a deal which enables it to display branding and its digital photo technology around the Roland Garros show courts with a rights package that includes the ‘Shot of the Day’ smartphone-created video of the most alluring point of the tournament each afternoon.
Its 2022 work follows in the footsteps of some of its previous standout tennis sponsorship activations such as its 2021 Wimbledon ‘Play With Heart’ campaign and its 2020 French Open ‘5G Focused’ marketing.
Leave a comment
You must be logged in to post a comment.