Beats had built a strong presence in the sport and fitness earphone category, with Powerbeats 3 being the #1 selling product worldwide. But while the brand continued to grow its cultural cred in sport and fitness, the rest of the category was busy launching competitive products crowding the category with similar innovations. This is what lead to the development of Powerbeats Pro, Beats most innovative product – not just in sport and fitness earphones, but more innovative than any product they had ever developed in any category. Our task was to reassert Beats’ leadership position in the sport and fitness category by introducing the next generation of completely wireless Powerbeats, placing a heightened focus on innovation and performance, without losing the cultural impact the brand has become known for. Simply put, we needed to establish Powerbeats Pro as the most advanced sport and fitness earphone in the world.

Powerbeats Pro has a special form factor, built to fit perfectly and securely allowing the athlete to move without distracting wires or discomfort. To show this in the film, we kept the frame locked onto our athletes’ profiles, keeping the product centered. This let us capture motion that is frenetic yet smooth, active yet grounded. The viewer feels the energy of these world-class athletes, yet is constantly reminded of the steadying presence of the product throughout. Shot this way, the earphones are very much present in picture, but unobtrusive to the flow of the action, which is a perfect analogy for the way they were designed to function for their users.

We had a ground-breaking innovation on our hands, but simply telling a straightforward innovation story would not be true to the Beats brand. We needed an emotional story, one that could speak not just directly to our athlete and fitness enthusiast target, but one that could also have broader meaning as a rallying cry in culture at large. So, we zeroed in on the powerful influence that music can have on athletes, giving them motivation and enhancing their performance. Reaching a flow state is the goal and distraction is the enemy, a physical, mental, and emotional challenge our product was perfectly set to fix. This set up our strategic jumping off point that by untethering athletes, removing distractions and disruptions to their motivation and flow state, we could unleash them into the most prolific version of themselves.

We launched our anthem spot on April 15th across eleven total markets and in twenty-five languages. The first glimpses of the spot were on the social media channels of the athletes who starred in it, followed quickly by appearances on TV, digital takeovers, streaming platforms, the official Beats site, in movie theaters and on YouTube. The current media plan has several large buys attached to significant events in sports and pop culture that will increase exposure of the spot, including the NBA Finals, Women’s World Cup, Avengers End Game, Game of Thrones, among others.

The anthem spot got over 37.4 million views within 48 hours after launching, 22% coming from our featured athletes' organic social posts. This resulted in over a million people visiting the product landing page to learn more, doubling the total email signups we’d already gathered since the product was announced. Additionally, the spot resonated, and was well received by viewers with 96% positive/neutral sentiment, a significant increase from the baseline 90% achieved by past campaigns.