The smartphone market is more competitive than ever. In a highly crowded category, we were tasked with launching the new Galaxy Note9, retailing at $1000. With its advanced power, speed and battery capabilities, previous models in the Galaxy Note range had been marketed as devices for business. However, to kick-start sales we needed to find a way to reposition the new Note9. So we turned to the fastest growing consumer group of 2018: mobile gamers. We discovered the same features that made the Note9 a great phone for business also made it a great phone for mobile gamers; with 65% indicating that battery life and processing power would influence their smartphone choice.

To capture gamers’ attention we didn’t make a campaign we made a character in the world's biggest game—Fortnite. 200+ million players regularly spend big bucks on outfits and characters, called ‘skins.’ The rarer the skin, the bigger the bragging rights. So to launch the new Galaxy Note9, Samsung and Fortnite partnered to create a whole new character in the game: The Galaxy Skin. The skin incorporated the brand’s colors and name and the only way to unlock it was to purchase the new Note9. To build hype, we gave the skin to the world's biggest gamer before anyone else. Ninja debuted the skin to 20 million viewers on YouTube and played with the character live on Twitch for his 13 million subscribers.

A series of research findings led us to the conclusion that Fortnite gamers were our perfect target audience. We knew that a new generation of serious games, like Fortnite, were being played on both consoles and smartphones. This meant gamers were increasingly looking for the exact improvements in performance that the Note9 delivered.

We also knew that a critical part of Fortnite is how players spend big bucks on outfits and characters, called ‘skins’. The rarer the skin they own, the more powerful they feel in the game. This is because one of people’s primary motivations for gaming is being able to express themselves more fully; 67% of gamers say gaming is a way to express their creativity.

To debut the Galaxy Skin, we created an unboxing film with a Fortnite twist. Life-sized replicas of the blue supply drop boxes from Fortnite landed on the doorstep of the world’s biggest gamer, Ninja. He unboxed the new Note9 and played with the Galaxy Skin, calling out how the phone performed along the way. Ninja then took the skin to Twitch and played with the character live in a real game of Fortnite for his 13 million subscribers. This video content became the main source of information about the Galaxy Skin, garnering over 20 million views.

Then we gave the Galaxy Skin to other influential Fortnite gamers and fans including Ali-A, Markiplier, SSSniperWolf and soccer superstar Harry Kane, with unboxing films of their own. A digital billboard in Times Square, targeted digital display, website and online film further promoted the Galaxy Skin to gamers.

The Galaxy Skin immediately became the most-hyped and most-wanted skin in Fortnite. Social mentions of Samsung in gaming increased by 2000% and mentions of the Galaxy Note9 jumped by 873%—in a single day. Overall search traffic for Note9 increased +97% with 95% average positive sentiment across the influencer content. Gamers were obsessed with the Galaxy Skin and they’d do anything to get it. They even attempted to download it from demo Note9 phones in retail stores. A re-sale market opened up on eBay and gamers sold the skin for as much as $7000. But most importantly, Galaxy Note9 pre-orders increased by 243% amongst 18-24 year-olds and we got fans of our competitors in-store and hands-on with the Note9 like never before. The Galaxy Skin was used in over 25 million games of Fortnite, per month, worldwide, and generated 2.6 billion impressions.