These days, Fair Weather Fan Syndrome (FWFS) is an all too common affliction. No sport is spared its characteristic ebb and flow, coming in and going out after a championship like the tide. When Super Bowls, championships and World Series are won, throngs of people are overjoyed with their newfound team identification; but when things go even slightly south? Well, it’s like it never happened.

The 2010 San Francisco Giants presented the perfect storm for FWFS. They won their first World Series in over 5 decades. The chances that the Giants would repeat their World Series victory in 2011 were slim. No one knew that better than the local broadcaster of Giants games, Comcast Sports Network. How could they maintain the huge gains in audience they earned in 2010 into 2011?

Our Idea?

Capture and sustain the attention of fair weather fans by finding and anointing the Giants World Championship Baby.

Using only owned media and an invitation spot cobbled together from stock footage for $3400, we launched a contest urging expectant moms to help us find the World Championship Baby – the baby who was conceived closest to the moment the Giants won the Series in 2010.

We managed to convince 48% of all eligible San Francisco expectant moms to register for the contest. And on August 1st, 100 registered babies were born. Four were born within an hour of the Giants winning the World Series. The Champion? Born within 8 minutes of the final out, Brooklynn Olivia Bird became the first World Championship Baby.

This unconventional promotion ended up crashing our client’s website by motivating 2.3 million visits in one month – 60% more than the month the Giants actually won the series.

We thought the best we could do was keep the same level of viewership on CSN for the Giants during a less than stellar season – we ended up increasing their share by 29%.