We created Fuel the Fire; a campaign using Facebook and Twitter directly targeting NSW fans. We gave them the chance to send GIO their messages of support, which would be crafted into a single team talk and delivered on their behalf to the NSW players at the team announcement.

We enlisted a former NSW player and Origin legend, Mark ‘MG’ Geyer, as our campaign ambassador, giving us immediate credibility and profile. His role was to call on fans to send GIO their motivational messages and be there to deliver the team talk, crafted from these messages, to the players at the official team announcement.

Implementation

Our Fuel the Fire campaign targeted NSW rugby league fans primarily on Facebook and Twitter, the main social hubs for Origin conversations. All content originated on the GIO pages, before being shared by our ambassador MG, the NSW team and Triple M.

Timeline

Launched May 5th, two weeks out from the NSW team announcement, led by a video calling on fans to send us their motivational messages for the team. Concluding May 27th, when our team talk video was played at the stadium before Game 1.

Placement

Every piece of content featured a call to action, asking fans to send in their #FueltheFire messages or watch and share our content, supported by advertising on the GIO, NSW team, and Triple M’s websites with spots on Triple M radio.

Scale

• $2.2 million earned media coverage

• 2.36 million total impressions

• 47k cumulative unique users

• 851 unique fan speeches written

• 194k total video views

By using its sponsorship of the NSW team to connect with the team’s fans in a meaningful way, GIO achieved their most highly-engaged, socially-driven campaign ever with Fuel the Fire.

• Reach : 27.1 million Total Impressions

• Engagement : 47,000 Social Engaged Users

• 368% increase in content share rate

• 160.9% increase in engagement rate

• $0.01 cost per view based on $1,200 spend

• 1030% increase in GIO organic impressions

Achievement against business targets

To show continued support of the NSW Blues and build salience & bonding, with a study from Australian Sponsorship News revealed that GIO was the 7th most highly associated brand with State of Origin. This success was driven by the vast amount of tagging and sharing that happened. Almost 60% of the impressions came from this type of reach.