In 2022, Amazon signed a deal with the NFL, giving Prime Video the right to stream Thursday Night Football exclusively. The rabid football fans were not happy at all with that. They feared that the corporation could make unwelcoming changes to the game. So we created a campaign directed to these unhappy fans.

The Prime Ball not only changed their opinion about Prime Video on the NFL, but it also turned many haters into new subscribers. The campaign helped the brand to achieve a record number of new Prime memberships - with more sign-ups than at any other time.

When the news about Prime Video and NFL partnership broke out, many football fans were looking forward to the innovations that Amazon would bring to the broadcast. But a significant number of the most conservative football fans were worried that the big corporation – who never had anything to do with American Football – could change the game they love. The negative sentiment on social media was growing, and Amazon needed to engage with its new audience, giving them confidence that nothing major would change in the game - just how and where people watch it.

Instead of running away from the problem, or trying to make to minimize it, we decided to have fun with it and make it bigger. Way bigger. For a few days, we purposefully turned football fans’ biggest nightmare into reality: we changed the game’s most sacred icon – the football itself. To make the change even scarier, the new ball design was inspired by the Amazon “smile” logo.

After a few days of madness on social media, Amazon revealed that Prime Video wasn’t changing anything on the game. Just where people watch it. The reveal increased the positive sentiment online, turning haters into fans and showing that Amazon was willing to bring more entertainment to their broadcast.

In the months leading up to the launch of Thursday Night Football on Prime Video, Amazon collected data from its new football audience. While the “Digital Natives” fans were excited and looking forward to what the new streaming platform could offer on the broadcast, the “Football Fanatics” were reluctant. Amazon needed to start developing a relationship with both of them. Many of those negative comments were happening on social media, so the brand started building a relationship with the new audience there.

Before creating the campaign, we created a new product. In partnership with Wilson, Amazon Prime Video developed a whole new football ball. We needed a ball inspired by the shape of the Amazon logo, but it still needed to be a working ball for the quarterbacks. The aerodynamics, size and weight were all elements that had to be taken into consideration. Because as part of our social campaign launch, we had planned to give the ball to the most famous quarterbacks in the NFL. They tried the ball during their training sessions. We filmed them and then used those videos as part of the campaign’s amplification.

Over 100 media outlets picked up the story, and it all started with one social media post on Prime Video’s account. The social video announcing the new ball broke the record as the most viewed and commented video on Prime Video’s social history by 3X. Those posts were shared by creators, influencers, celebrities, and brands such as Richard Sherman, Jerry Rice, Barry Sanders, Deion Sanders, Dude Perfect, Lacey Taylor Rooks, Andrew Whitworth, Wilson, NFL, and others. More than just turning haters into fans, the campaign turned haters into new subscribers for Prime. The Prime Ball helped to bring more Prime sign-ups than any other time in Prime Video's history - more than Prime Day.