To promote the Battle of The Baddest, “Rumble” took the decades old boxing promo and reimagined it with scale, cinematic storytelling and two characters as big as the fight itself. Add to that a mandarin-language cover of the Nancy Sinatra classic Bang Bang, and it’s easy to see why UK media outlets called it “the greatest boxing promo in history”.

Riyadh Season is the entertainment destination in Riyadh, the capital city of Saudi Arabia, that runs for 6 months out of the year (October - March), and has something for everyone. From restaurants, to concerts and plays, to sporting events, to shopping.

While Riyadh Season has been around for several years, it has historically been a popular destination for mostly locals and visitors from other Middle Eastern countries.

Tasked to develop a campaign that introduced Riyadh Season, an entertainment destination in the capital of Saudi Arabia, to the world by creating promotion around its marquee event; the “Battle of the Baddest” boxing matchup.

The fight was between two undisputed kings of combat—World Heavyweight Champion Tyson Fury and UFC Champion Francis Ngannou. So to get the world excited, we reimagined the tired old boxing promo and created a cinematic hype film as big and spectacular as the fight itself.

“Rumble”, a 90-second film based on the old boxing saying of “living rent free in your opponent’s head”; something that happens in the lead up to any big fight. As we watch Tyson Fury and Francis Ngannou train for the biggest fight of their careers, they don’t just sense their opponent training—they feel it—each sending psychological shockwaves back and forth between their two hometowns, and making the whole world rumble in the process. This was all set to a mandarin-language cover of the Nancy Sinatra classic Bang Bang, performed by Betty Chung.

To kick off this year’s Riyadh Season, The Battle of The Baddest brought together two of the world’s biggest fighters from two different codes in one big event—World Heavyweight Champion Tyson Fury and UFC Champion Francis Ngannou—for the biggest crossover fight in history. This was bigger than the boxing and MMA communities; we needed to get the whole world excited, so we set out to reimagine the tired old boxing promo and create a cinematic hype film as big and spectacular as the fight itself.

This work was part of a multi-channel campaign that accumulated a staggering 10.5 billion impressions, which translated into an earned media value of $30.7 million. The campaign engaged over 104,000 individuals in online discussions which involved a 57% positive sentiment rate, solidifying its imprint as a resonant and positively received body of work.

Sources: Netbase - Twitter, Blogs, Forums, News, Consumer Reviews (excludes Instagram, Facebook, TikTok etc.) October 6-27, 2023 (beginning of campaign until the day before the fight). Meltwater - PR Social Listening for total potential news reach, October 2023