In July 2019 Chinese smartphone maker OPPO activated its ICC Cricket World Cup 2019 sponsorship through the global ‘Be A Shot Maker’ campaign which sought to consolidate its position in South Asia and drive awareness in Europe and the Southern Hemisphere, built its brand awareness and launch a new handset and reinforce its camera/photography USP through an integrated global and local activation programme.
Territory: Global
Agency: 160over90
Objectives
The brand’s challenge to agency 160over90 was to solve the problem of how OPPO, a brand almost unknown outside of Asia, drive awareness on the global stage and overcome pre-conceived attitudes towards Chinese technology brands to a mass audience (particularly in European and southern hemisphere markets) and promote specific products.
The geographical objectives were to strengthen the brand position across South Asia and use the tournament as a primary pillar for its entry into European and Southern Hemisphere markets.
The main target audience segment was cricket fans aged between 18 to 45-years-old, educated middle income earners and ‘technology freaks’.
The three key objectives:
- Boost brand awareness
- Drive product awareness
- Develop emotional connection with primary target
Activation
The agency’s solution was a multi-strand, global activation programme called ‘Be A Shot Maker’ which blended the emotional with the practical and which was adapted to the patriotic nature of fan support during the World Cup and based around cricket fan passion for those who play the most difficult, innovative shots – the shot makers.
The activation launched with an emotional global campaign introducing the brand, its new visual style following a rebrand and a product-led collaboration with Getty Images which encouraged fans to adopt that ‘Shot Maker’ attitude to use their phones to capture perfect sporting shots.
This was led by a global television ad which set out to the concept of being a shot maker and aired across television, digital and social platforms and in-ground.
The hero spot was customised to specific markets by featuring local market players (eg Sohaib Malik in Pakistan and Jos Buttler in England) as the hero ambassador.
There was further social support through a behind-the-scenes Shot Maker social spot.
A supporting strand saw the agency commission British artist Lucy Vigrass to create a bespoke collection of illustrations celebrating cricket’s return to its home country which were used across OOH, print and digital advertising for the duration of the tournament to provide ‘eye-catching brand presence’.
48 hours ahead of the start of the World Cup, OPPO held a campaign event fronted by ambassadors Alistair Cook and Jos Buttler which included introducing the campaign visuals and the UK launch of the brand’s new Reno phone in collaboration with EE.
To promote the key OPPO phone feature – camera quality – and reinforce the quality of the camera, a further activation strand saw the brand link with Getty on a project to capture the World Cup highs and lows through the lens of the Reno 10X by making more than 1000 images available to the public for free through Getty
The campaign also included stadium related rights (such as pitch perimeter board signage, a branded pitch mat behind the wicket and in-ground social mosaics) and OPPO’s two exclusive ICC marketing promotions: the ‘Shot Of The Day’ award which also enabled fans to get onto the big stadium screen by submitting pictures of themselves on social media using the #BeAShotMaker (images were shown twice per game) and the ICC showcasing a selection of the Getty campaign images and videos from every game on its website and social media.
On the ground initiatives saw OPPO build a product display at the opening and final games of the tournament where fans could trial the new Reno 10x zoom and Reno 5G (plus the brand also offered a first opportunity for fans in the UK to trial 5G connectivity on-site in stadium), while OPPO also distributed 4 & 6 cards to fans attending the India vs Pakistan fixture.
Indeed, as well as the core global activation, other key local markets (including Australia, India, New Zealand, Pakistan and Sri Lanka) also ran supporting local campaigns to further strengthen brand awareness and its association with the ICC World Cup.
Outcome
In terms of brand awareness, OPPO’s on-pitch logo and television ad reached the tournament’s 1.6bn TV audience, while the campaign generated 40 media articles with a combined potential reach of 17.76m and OPPO was the top searched ICC partner through the World Cup
Product awareness related activation statistics included 32,400 photos of cricket fans taken on OPPO Reno handsets and printed free, 12,900 fan mosaic prints on ICC social mosaics, 900 photo mosaics filling up on match days and more than 1000 unique images captured by Getty
On social media, the campaign generated a 90% increase in OPPO Instagram views, an 84% increase in OPPO Twitter interactions and generated 32,000 uses of the campaign’s #BeAShotMaker hashtag (an average usage of 28 per hour throughout the tournament).
OPPO’s 118 posts across ICC digital and social platforms using #BeAShotMaker gained 1.31bn impressions and 6bn video views.
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