ITV Fever Pitch: Football World Cup Activation
Client: ITV Stakeholders: Rufus Radcliffe, Chief Marketing Officer and Director of Direct to Consumer, ITV Role: Project Coordinator
Description:
The 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil was a once in a lifetime experience – the greatest tournament in the world for football fans all over the world! ITV are continually on a mission to turn viewers into fans of the brand, so we hit upon the idea of bringing the spirit of the World Cup in Brazil back to the UK. In June and July 2014, we created a unique outdoor fan park in Manchester - the ITV Fever Pitch was open to everyone, for free. Over 30,000 visitors across the month watched World Cup matches with us live and enjoyed the magic of Brazil – from International Beach Soccer tournaments to Brazilian BBQs (not to mention the samba dancers!).
As one of the main UK broadcasters of the tournament we didn’t want to just tell our viewers about the World Cup in Brazil, we wanted to immerse them in it – ITV-style! This would be a once in a lifetime sporting experience, so our campaign strapline across all platforms became: ‘Brace yourself – It’s going to be emotional….’
This would help us change the perception about ITV Sport that we cared more about the advertisers than the fans. We aimed to show everyone that we understood the emotional rollercoaster fans go through watching sport.
The experiential element of the campaign was integral – and a rare marketing opportunity to turn our viewers into fans! What better way to immerse our viewers in this one-off sporting occasion than an outdoor fan park screening the tournament and bringing some samba spirit to the UK? Somewhere that fans could experience the emotion of the World Cup and celebrate with thousands of others – for free! We were able to create a memorable experience for thousands of visitors, who in turn could share their experiences with millions online and spread the word about ITV.
Stakeholder Feedback:
"I just wanted to say a huge thank you to everyone for all your hard work making ITV Fever Pitch such a massive success. Undoubtedly there have been a lot of learnings along the way, but it has been a real triumph - from the CSR programme in the day, the pro beach football through to the evening screenings - and only one wash out in a month which we'd definitely have taken before the event (although try telling that to Adrian's team!) Obviously we would have liked England to have stayed in the tournament a bit longer but you can't have everything... Thanks again - I know what a huge and ambitious undertaking the whole event has been for everyone involved. Now for the Rugby World Cup..."
Rufus Radcliffe, Chief Marketing Officer and Director of Direct to Consumer, ITV
Using 500 tonnes of sand (and a bit of ITV magic) we transformed the derelict car park of the old Granada TV Studios, and brought a Brazilian oasis to central Manchester. We hosted up to 2000 fans a day. Visitors could apply online and the free tickets were quickly snapped up. Between 12th June and 13th July, we screened 25 live matches from ITV and BBC – we didn’t want to miss a minute of the action!
We hosted live International Beach Soccer tournaments with professional teams competing in the giant sand-pitch. We extended professional coaching sessions to local schools, when not open to the public, and lent the facilities to local charities too.
We had ITV style half-time entertainment - our comperes handed out prizes for penalty-scoring and sandcastle competitions, local celebs from Corrie and Emmerdale even joined in! Our teams of cheerleaders and free-style footballers were cheered on by the crowds. And our ‘Sambacam’ caught members of the crowd playing the samba drums live on the big screen.
We teamed up with a local Brazilian restaurant chain so visitors could enjoy an authentic Brazilian BBQ and Beach Bar while watching the footie. A samba band and loads of samba dancers brought the carnival atmosphere to the park every night.
We got EVERYONE involved pre and post-match too. Families headed to the Action Zone for face-painting, and were able to try out their skills against each other and freestyle footballers!
The creative on site tied in with our on-air promo. Huge graphics capturing fans’ ‘goal faces’ brought ITV’s on-air campaign alive; the Brazilian national colours of green and gold provided a unifying theme across the site; astro turf and sand across the site reinforced the football and Brazilian themes.
Stewards, volunteers and professional beach soccer players wore branded uniforms and sporting bibs. We had loads of goodies on site to maximise our brand exposure – after all, everyone loves a giveaway! ITV Fever Pitch branded buckets & spades, Bobble bottles, and deckchairs. Umbrellas and ponchos ensured everyone could enjoy the action – rain or shine!
We joined forces with our charity partner ‘Join in’ to engage a diverse group of volunteers from the local community who helped us at the event.
The response on social media via #ITVFeverPitch was overwhelmingly positive and helped spread the word. The hundreds of tweets we received went something like this…
Such a brilliant day at #ITVFeverPitch. Thank you!
@emstoth
Well #ITVFeverpitch is bloody brilliant. Rain, go away. No seriously.
@alastairjdickie
Absolutely cracking day at #ITVFeverpitch. Great enterainment. Great football. Thank you for the free great day out.
@ianGcreative
ITV Fever Pitch was the biggest experiential event ITV has carried out to date. All of our tickets sold out and we had over 30,000 visitors to the park; made up of 28,135 ticket holders & 2,472 community programme participants.
To keep us on our toes, and to make sure we keep improving, we carried out a post event survey. We’re thrilled to bits with the responses:
- 84% of visitors rated their experience 8-10 or higher!
- 62% of visitors said they felt better about ITV after their visit
- 79% of visitors said they would have paid for their experience
- 94% of visitors said they would share their experience with others
- The community programme’s average rating for the experience was 9.8 out of 10
- 100% of the community programme’s respondents wanted to tell people about their experience
Visitors raved about the experience, returning several times and saying what a great family day out we’d created. People really got on board with the spirit of the football and the carnival, we even had a marriage proposal!
Tracking our traditional PR impacts across print, TV, radio, publicity and we had over 617,000,000 impacts! The Fever Pitch fan part garnered loads of attention in the local press from the Manchester Evening News to shout outs on Capital, Magic and Key 103 radio stations. The fan park even featured live on the ITV News. A time-lapse camera demonstrated in super-fast time how we transformed the venue into a samba-tastic fan park!