Dirk Nowitzki is the greatest German athlete of all time. He’s not only known for a legendary career, but also for his loyalty and sportsmanship. He’s the only NBA player in history to play only for the same team his entire career – 21 years. In order to promote his last NBA game ever, German sports broadcaster DAZN tasked us with taking over Germany’s conversation around Dirk’s last game.

Dirk Nowitzki is the greatest German athlete of all time. He’s not only known for a legendary career, but also for his loyalty and sportsmanship. Nowitzki is the only NBA player in history to play only for the same team his entire career. For 21 years it was one for all. To promote his final game that was exclusively broadcast on German sports streaming network DAZN, we turned “one for all” into “all for one”. With the vision to start a movement and take over Germany’s conversation around Dirk’s last game.

In order to take over the conversation, we turned Dirk Nowitzki’s legendary jersey number (41) into a way to pay tribute online – #ALL41. By creating the most engaging hashtag around Dirk’s last game, we were able to take over the social conversation and spread our message far beyond our own advertisements. Turning Dirk’s last game into a must-see for every German.

The digital campaign kicked off with an online film promoting our hashtag #ALL41 and Dirk’s last game on DAZN – the only place where German fans could watch it. Then, specially designed #ALL41 jerseys were sent out to Germany’s biggest sport stars like Mario Götze and Marc-André ter Stegen. They paid tribute to Dirk on their social media channels and asked their fans to join. And their fans did. But fans weren’t the only ones paying tribute: TV stations, influencers, politicians and even brands used our hashtag to thank Dirk. Making #ALL41 Twitter’s #1 trending topic.

The #ALL41 jersey, together with Germany’s biggest sports stars, every relevant German

media outlet, dozens of influencers and countless fans helped, #ALL41 to become Twitter’s

#1 trending topic in Germany. The campaign reached over 32 million media impressions and

more than 4.6 million social interactions. Thanks to the social buzz that #ALL41 generated,

Dirk Nowitzki’s last game had 1,200% more viewers than an average NBA game broadcast

on DAZN. Showing Dirk that a whole nation stood behind him on this special night.