The Minnesota Vikings socially shared a strikingly successful season through an inventive engagement marketing strand called ‘Skol Skribbles’: a Snapchat-based social media campaign that saw various players have their team photos transformed to fit their nickname.
These images were then shared through the season via the Vikings’ Snapchat: fans were invited to design their own images which then had a chance to be shared on the team’s Snapchat story (if those players pulled off a notable play during the game).
This YouTube video showcases the initial wave of Snapchat work with the first set of player drawings based on player nicknames which were served up during the ‘Minnesocial’ game in 2017.
It sees a Snapchat influencer Evan Garber takes these names and creates Snapchat magic with his drawings: for example, it includes the Vikings’ shutdown cornerback Xavier Rhodes known by ‘Rhodes Closed’.
“This is a unique process because it’s taking an idea conceived by fans, coming up with a creative way to enhance it with art and save each step of the drawing along the way so I can create a video showcasing the full transformation,” explained Garber.
“In the end, it gives the fans a fun and new way to look at their favourite players as well as drawings not usually seen on this social media platform that they can share with friends!”
The Minnesota Vikings fell agonisingly at the last hurdle in the team’s bid to become the first NFL franchise ever to play in its own Super Bowl, but they still finished a great 2017/8 season with their best record since 1998.
So, naturally, with so much on field success there were plenty of exciting moments to share socially: none bigger than the ‘Minneapolis Miracle’ – a stunning last-second Stefon Diggs touchdown which sent the Vikings to the NFC championship game.
We're taking #TransformationTuesday to a new level on @Snapchat.
Now we want you to show us what you've got!
: vikings pic.twitter.com/xsg44Q6wwd
— Minnesota Vikings (@Vikings) January 10, 2018
With a winning season this year, fans are increasingly eager to follow the Minnesota Vikings on as many social and digital channels as possible.
The marketing team wanted to find a way to leverage growing platform Snapchat for the fans by celebrating their creativity and dedication week after week.
So the objective behind ‘Skol Skribbles’ was to find a unique way to use Snapchat to enable fans to participate in a way that is platform-native and innovative (and which maintains the integrity of the platform).
The goal? Transform our best team photos into something new each week and ask our fans to do the same.
The catch? Use only the features that Snapchat offers to make each work of art.
Each Transformation Tuesday, we select our favorite fan-generated images and post them to the public Snapchat story for thousands of other Vikings fans to see.
To ensure high creative standards, the team partnered exclusively with a skilled illustrator called Evan Garber who developed a set of hand-draw illustrations of Vikings players within Snapchat over images.
“This is a unique process because it’s taking an idea conceived by fans, coming up with a creative way to enhance it with art and save each step of the drawing along the way so I can create a video showcasing the full transformation. In the end, it gives the fans a fun and new way to look at their favorite players as well as drawings not usually seen on this social media platform that they can share with friends!” said Evan Garber
In addition to creating weekly before and after illustrations for Transformation Tuesday, the team also worked with Garber to develop fun Snapchat stickers that fans could save and use on their own Snapchat creations.
“We’ve been doing Snapchat stickers throughout the season,” Scott Kegley, Vikings Executive Director of Digital Media and Innovation.
“We’ll post some of those stickers, and then you can cut them out and use them on your own stories. We use them on our Snapchat Stories throughout the year.”
From a process standpoint, the activation is on a recurring cycle.
The team developed a ‘boilerplate’ video that introduces the program each week so fans know what to expect and then it follows a step-by-step process to make Transformation Tuesday happen each week in under 24 hours:
1) Our team provides the illustrator with a popular or standout photo from the week prior (either in a game or at practice).
2) The Illustrator spends time creating a Snapchat masterpiece, which usually takes about one business day.
3) Our team posts the video of the illustration and directions to Snapchat for fans to replicate and do on their own.
3) Our team then waits for fans to send us their creations back via Snapchat. We then save our favorites and re-upload them to our Snapchat Story as a featured mini-gallery on the same day.
The Vikings marketing team says that around 35,000 fans viewed the Skol Skribbles campaign each week through the regular season.
While Snapchat’s reporting tool aren’t particularly robust, the team says it shares the Skol Skribbles campaigns with more than 35,000 people every week.
It also reported that around 1000 people per week screenshot the Transformation Tuesday image with the intention of drawing their own design.
The Vikings then select and publish somewhere between five and 10 winning submissions to its Snapchat story each week.
Its Snapchat engagement rates for Transformation Tuesday typically reach 3% – well above the industry average for reach on channels like Facebook.
The Vikings also anecdotally report fans sending messages that show they are extremely eager and excited for the chance to be featured on the official Vikings account.
Snapchat Scribbles debuted when the Minnesota Vikings held their first #Minnesocial night, on 1 September, creating a unique social media theme for their final preseason game against the Miami Dolphins.
The event saw the team work with social influencers and had several social activations throughout the stadium and during the live broadcast across multiple platforms.
Comment:
Other than the campaign title pun…..we love this Vikings campaign (admittedly, partly because there are so many Vikings fans on the Activative team).
But it is a genuinely innovative use of the immediate engagement opportunities and benefits of boosting and curating low-latency fan interaction on Snapchat.
What is it about Minnesota sports teams and Snapchat?
Wasn’t it the Minnesota Wild NHL side that was the first sports team to experiment with Snapchat Spectacles (see case study)?
Links:
Minnesota Vikings
https://www.youtube.com/user/OfficialMNVikings
https://www.instagram.com/vikings/
https://www.facebook.com/minnesotavikings
