Feyenoord fans carry the club in their hearts. We wanted to show how this fanship affects the heart during the most important and exciting match of the year, Feyenoord – Ajax. How much excitement can a football fan’s heart handle? To show this we measured the heartbeat of 100 fans realtime during the Dutch Classic and made it visible for 1.2 million viewers at home.

The activation also gave us the opportunity to link to the shared mission of Opel, Feyenoord and The Dutch Heart Foundation. Many people consider a beating heart to be self-evident. But what if your heart suddenly stops beating?

The heartbeat of the fans was also a very relevant addition to the live broadcast on FOX Sports. They recognized the value of this unique activation, which enabled us to make a deal with them at a fairly low price.

Implementation & Timeline

Feyenoord – Ajax was scheduled on November 8 and the technological initiative was preceded by two months of extensive preparations. The preparation phase included the development of a dedicated smartphone app and numerous meetings with all stakeholders. Also 2 ‘test matches’ in which the heartbeat monitoring technology and broadcasting feed were tested turned out to be crucial. In the end, over 200 people working for 7 different organizations were involved in the preparations and execution.

Placement & Scale

Next to many online news articles, buzz on social media and coverage by FOX Sports, the heartbeat of the fans received substantial additional coverage. After the first press release various television programmes made an item on the activation, which were broadcasted on national television. After the second press release, articles appeared on the front pages of the two biggest newspapers in the Netherlands (AD & De Telegraaf).

Reach

• 77 articles published online, in print, national and regional media, with a cumulative reach of around 10 million people.

• Five radio stations and two national TV programmes reported about the activation.

• Media value exceeded €1,500,000, whereas the total investments were less than €100,000.

Engagement

• 15.000 unique visitors on opel.nl/voorhetleven, to watch the heartbeat of the fans realtime during the match.

Impact

• Unprompted awareness for the collaboration between Opel, Feyenoord and the Dutch Heart Foundation increased from 29% to 66% for Feyenoord fans and from 2% to 7% for Dutch population (17 million inhabitants).

• Prompted awareness for the collaboration between Opel, Feyenoord and the Dutch Heart Foundation increased from 74% to 91% for Feyenoord fans and from 20% to 26% for Dutch population.

• Around the heartbeat of the fans, The Dutch Heart Foundation acquired five times more volunteers with reanimation skills than normal.