Yahoo!: PENALTY SHOOTOUT

Credits & Description:

Category: Best Use of Social Media Marketing

Advertiser: YAHOO!

Product/Service: YAHOO!

Agency: MPG

Date of First Appearance: May 15 2010

Entrant Company: MPG, New York, USA

Entry URL: http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/football/worldcup/penaltyshootout/

Global Strategic Planning Director: Fredda Hurwitz (Havas Sports & Entertainment)

Managing Partner: Jim Dowling (Cake)

Consultancy Director: Mark Horley (Havas Sports & Entertainment)

PR Manager: Zoe Stainsby (Havas Sports & Entertainment / Cake)

Account Director: Nicola Rutledge (Havas Sports & Entertainment / Cake)

Global Events director: Clive Little (Havas Sports & Entertainment / Cake)

Digital Planner: Steve Cater (Havas Sports & Entertainment / Cake)

Media placement: Experiential - Live Penalty Shootout, 8 Markets + Final In Brazil - 15th May – 28th May

Media placement: PR - Online EPR - 15th May – 10th July

Media placement: Social Media - Facebook Banners, Social Networks - 1st May Onwards

Media placement: Blogger Outreach - 220 Global Bloggers – Own Sites - 15th May Onwards

Media placement: Yahoo! Network Media - Yahoo! Sports Pages - 15th May Onwards



Insights, Strategy & the Idea

Despite unprecedented success during their 2002 and 2006 FIFAworld.com sponsorship, YAHOO! didn’t renew the partnership and opted to attract fans to their site on their own. As a result, YAHOO! couldn’t reference “World Cup” and didn’t want to appear as if ambushing one of the most emotionally charged events.



But the largest online provider of sport content needed to do something to be a part of the WC buzz.



Our challenge: deliver compelling, unique and innovative content to engage football fans globally during World Cup2010, when YAHOO! was no longer a FIFA sponsor.



Without a doubt, the most exciting moment of any game is the penalty kick. As much feared as it is loved, a penalty shootout exposes the emotional appeal of the game. Understanding fan angst, we focused on the universal truth of the emotion surrounding a shootout and allowed fans to live it for themselves, holding their breath, waiting, hoping, praying.



Creative Execution

YAHOO! Penalty Shootout is you vs. the world, putting the fans in the heart of the game.



We developed a global online shootout game where users played "live", 24 hours a day throughout the World Cup.



It took 13 weeks and 16 people to produce the game. The simulation penalty-kick game was created using dramatic lighting and several powerful Canon 5D cameras that captured multiple action angles, video edits and sound design that added to the tension and drama. The shoot caught +200 clips that covered the various kicking/blocking actions seen during games.



Live events took place in eight cities, giving fans a once-in-a-lifetime chance to test their penalty kick skills live, against star goalkeepers.



Social media, PR, networking and influencer marketing extended the message.



The prize? The two best online players met in Rio de Janeiro to face ex-England goalkeeper David Seaman. The winner received tickets to 16 sporting events culminating at the next World Cup in Brazil 2014.



Results and Effectiveness

We harnessed penalty kick power to dramatically increase user interaction wand establish YAHOO! as THE credible, go-to World Cup resource:



• +2.1M games played (6x forecast)

• 430,000 registered users (2x estimates)

• 11,600,000 gaming minutes (8x estimates)

• 45,476,000 total blogger/unique monthly visitors

• +16M social impressions, 28,900 Facebook fans

• 832 PR pieces

• 12,000 live events attendees

• 23% of traffic from outside Yahoo!, additionally covered/discussed throughout the cultural zeitgeist (via internal tracking)



Average:

• 6 minutes/game

• 26 minutes and 5 games per user



Media-firsts:

• global interactive online game + eight-market global launch

• online experience turned offline with an established winner (not potential)

• Yahoo! Indonesia launch

• activations in new territories (Korea)