Mid May saw Bwin launch a movie thriller style campaign leveraging Russia 2018 called ‘Who Stole The Cup’ which stars a squad of big name football ambassadors including Diego Maradona, Cafu, Vicente del Bosque and Stefan Effenburg (and, er, German swimmer Franziska van Almsick).
Launched a month ahead of the kick off of this year’s Fifa World Cup, the campaign is built around a series of five films – all telling the evolving story of football legends plotting to steal the iconic trophy – and the creative runs across television, out-of-home and online channels.
Initially teased online from 8 May,
the central two-and-a-half minute launch spot, directed by Pedro Martin-Calero, introduced the campaign concept on 15 May.
The teaser spot encourages consumers to click through to the digital site to make their own sleuth selection as to #WhoStoleTheCup?
Who Stole The Cup?
1. MARADONA
2. CAFU
3. DEL BOSQUE
4. EFFENBERGMake your choice: https://t.co/A1Dja0mwKM #WhoStoleTheCup? pic.twitter.com/5gaoKR7eIr
— bwin (@bwin) May 18, 2018
The climax of the GVC owned sportsbook brand’s campaign, which will reveal the outcome of the heist, will be released to coincide with the start of the tournament on 15 June.
The core set of spots is further supported by a series of behind-the-scenes video interviews: all conducted by former France international Robert Pires and amplified on bwin.com and across the brand’s social channels.
The multi-market, athlete ambassador fronted, European ambush campaign is running in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Spain, Sweden and the UK.
“Being smart, creative and bold is in GVC’s DNA and again our teams have delivered with this blockbuster World Cup campaign, it will entertain and engage our players and audiences globally, plus reinforce bwin’s position as Europe’s leading and most innovative sportsbook,” explains Bwin chief marketing officer Adam Lewis.
“To be the best you need to work with the best and the talent we involved in this campaign is legendary, we are not here for second place.”
Comment:
The Activative team has always been up for the challenge when it comes to a Cluedo campaign and a mystery-solving marketing initiative.
But, from the creative released thus far, we’ve no idea at all whodunit.
But we do know Maradona stole the World Cup from England with his Hand Of God handball cheating in Mexico 1986, so our early money is on him.
We like the idea from Bwin (which has an impressive stable of sports sponsorships in its stable ( https://www.bwin.com/en/p/about-us/sponsoring/history), but it’s not the first time sports event marketing as revolved around trophy theft.
Another notable recent example of this tactic is Jaguar’s AELTC Wimbledon 2017 campaign (see case study).
Links:
Bwin:
https://www.youtube.com/user/bwin
https://www.facebook.com/bwinUK
BBH Sport
http://www.bartleboglehegarty.com/london/bbh-sport/
