The process commenced with an extensive consultancy phase with both, Bitget and Lionel Messi’s team, to conceptualise a narrative that reflected the worlds of both Crypto trading, and elite-level football to deliver the hero brand video.

As part of the consultancy, WePlay undertook a series of strategic workshops to uncover a set of insights that would help us to define our creative direction.

Using these insights we developed a range of low to high-fidelity storyboards whilst sculpting the script to complement the tonality of the video.

WePlay then defined the visual aesthetics for the video which were based upon high impact, quick transitions, stylised lighting and bold typography, stripping back any background noise and placing Messi as the focal point of the campaign.

The shoot was meticulously planned, with every minute accounted for. The shoot encompassed a wide array of production executions, including two photography shoots, behind-the-scenes footage, short form stills and video, and signed merchandise.

These key elements were enhanced through the post-production phase where bespoke music, sound design, grading, and rota-scoping were all used to deliver a world-class final product.

WePlay worked very closely with Messi and his team, to deliver a range of additional content to be used throughout the follow-on campaign.

With these insights in hand, we implemented an effective customer acquisition strategy that would deliver paid subscriptions and reduce high levels of churn.

Using first-party data, our ‘connected audiences’ and a prospecting set of engaged combat sports fans, we activated global media campaigns that were both personalised and tailored to individual local markets.

Campaigns were optimised and developed through local language, which included markets such as Russia and Japan, whereby localised assets and creative were developed and deployed.

We also identified new strategic opportunities in countries with a large MMA fanbase and enough disposable income to afford the product, namely Mexico, Poland and Kazakhstan.

We analysed Utah Jazz’s digital data points across social, web and CRM to collate audience learnings, and identify crossovers, gaps and opportunities. This helped us understand:

• Deterministic data – purchase behaviour, subscription history, log-in/survey data
• Third-party data – browsing behaviour, search patterns, content consumption
• Demographic data – age and gender, location, profession/education

We know that engaged fans drive increased response so we defined the pathway to purchase and identified high-value audiences – including local, national and global fans.

Social growth focuses primarily on Facebook and TikTok. We run a ‘glocal’ campaign strategy to engage non-English speaking markets, using translated copy and localised assets.

To boost ticket sales, we target rich data segments with paid social and search campaigns to drive ‘fear of missing out’ by showcasing epic scenes fans can only experience in-person. This involves eye-popping creative in various ad formats, with conversion through response-optimised creative assets.

To boost merchandise sales, data-led planning and use of best-in-class biddable tech platforms optimises and serves ads in real-time to key audiences.

Paid media drives awareness and enquiries of summer camps, with data-led content and messaging that spans the full conversion funnel.

We implemented a compelling digital strategy to meet content objectives, increase reach through owned, earned and media tactics, and helped FIFA build a closer relationship with its fans.

During the research phase, we uncovered actionable insights to guide creative processes and ensure content outputs met various goals.

Our define-and-refine strategy included activities such as:

• a channel audit to comprehensively understand FIFA’s audience and content performance
• setting clear KPIs and content measurement criteria to assess the performance

Audience insights identified key moments in fans’ lives, and across the football and cultural calendars, to boost content performance across platforms.

Meanwhile, we devised five-core workstreams that would position the governing body as the No1 social destination for global football fans:

• social audience intelligence, to inform and improve content development and output
• content strategy and planning, to maximise value and impact across FIFA content modes and moments
• drive innovation and maximise content by working closer and smarter with platform partners
• owned, earned and paid media tactics to increase reach
• strengthening FIFA’s relationship with fans via a community management strategy

Each workstream was an integral component of our ‘surface strategy’, which shifted thinking away from platform-led objectives to align with how modern football fans consume content at a surface level.

We executed this across Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, Snapchat, TikTok, Twitch and Spotify, and delivered content that engaged fans globally.

When first partnering with Yokohama Tyres, we identified key target audiences to produce an engagement-led, social-first content strategy. This was the key to driving significant growth in global brand and product awareness.

Our objective was to engage, excite and delight audiences around the world, telling the brand’s story through the lens of football. The strategy involved owned and paid channels, and was activated across Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

Content was designed to reach a global audience of fans. With an ‘always-on’ approach, we developed digital and social campaigns around Chelsea fixtures, player birthdays, seasons and cultural celebrations. We also rewarded fans’ participation with free tickets and merchandise.

As ESPN Player broadcasts a variety of live sports, audiences tend to behave in a seasonal pattern. Many fans subscribe before their preferred sports season begins – but unsubscribe once it ends.

This is a consistent trend across the subscriptions, live rights and OTT landscape, given that major sports leagues have a fixed start and end date. That means there is a short window when the platform is most valuable for specific fans.

Our search and programmatic campaigns therefore need to be highly targeted to each sports season and fan depending on the time of year.

To solve this, we employed advanced planning and strategy development, alongside our own proprietary data, to create the perfect platform for campaign expansion and growth for ESPN Player.

We used a data-led approach to pivot and plan campaigns based on current sports seasons, promoting content that would actively drive engagement for our target audience. This strategy ensured that ESPN Player would capitalise on relevance and demonstrate immediate value to prospects.

Our Creative Studio developed customised assets for each sports season, which helped ensure campaigns were optimised. The work included assets for individual high-profile games, which were promoted alongside key search terms immediately before the events took place.

During periods without premium live rights, we implemented a strategy to promote the depth of archive content on the platform – attracting new subscribers and mitigating churn.