The “My Other Team is Mexico” campaign was PR-driven at its core - designed explicitly to generate conversation and news coverage related to the relationship between the United States and Mexico. Wells Fargo was able to harness its limited sponsorship of the Mexican National Team and turn it into a massive cultural conversation, becoming the 3rd most mentioned brand in the 2018 FIFA World Cup on Twitter – behind only Nike and Adidas. It was a significant achievement for an American bank and non-World Cup sponsor.

For 18 months, Wells Fargo, America’s 4th largest bank, had been embroiled in scandal. The brand was beaten down; more “financial” messaging wasn’t going to spark reconsideration. We needed a new way in, and found our answer by focusing on:

1) The U.S. failed to qualify for the World Cup,

2) Therefore, a vast U.S. audience was heading towards the tournament without a team to root for.

3) Wells Fargo held a long-standing niche sponsorship of the Mexican National Team, America’s biggest rival, and pride of 28mm Mexican-American fans in the U.S.

4) The U.S. Administration’s immigration policies were heightening the conversation around the value and meaning of the U.S./Mexico relationship.

We set out to transform the Mexican National Team sponsorship into a meaningful, inclusive message for a mass American audience and in doing so, drive consideration around Wells Fargo products.

The brief: America for Mexico.

The idea, “My Other Team is Mexico,” was designed to leverage sports and political passions of Americans and play off the socio-political tension between countries. The premise was simple: Team USA failed to qualify, however, our neighbor Mexico was participating. While we’re rivals, the truth is we have much in common, and four years is a long time to wait to have a chance to root for Team USA again. So, we leveraged Landon Donovan – the face of American soccer – to rally Americans to redefine the rivalry and root for Mexico, this time.

It was devised to give American fans the permission to root for their archrival, and to provide all fans the fun tools to participate like never before by showcasing their devout – or new – allegiance to the Mexican National Team on social, the heart of both sports and political conversation in 2018.

The communications strategy had to demand attention. As a bank and non-World Cup sponsor we knew it would be easy to get lost in the noise. Calculated risk was central to success, as was precise timing in order to make the very most of the moment. We wanted to make a bold, inclusive statement for the American public so we used Landon Donovan – former Captain, U.S. Men’s Soccer Team and face of American soccer – as our centerpiece.

With U.S./Mexico relations as the cultural backdrop, we knew Landon advocating for the Mexican team would drive conversation and sports talk dialogue. To maximize coverage and pass along, we kicked off the campaign with a personal social media post from Landon. It was followed quickly with broadcast and social assets that: 1) made it easy to get behind the campaign, and 2) provided unique value to all Mexican National Team fans.

To ignite conversation, the campaign launched in social with a single post the day before Mexico’s first game. It featured Landon declaring his support of the Mexican National Team and encouraging everyone to join Wells Fargo in making Mexico their “other team.”

To activate engagement, we launched our Giphy channel — which offered a series of animated and live action gifs that fans could use in their social posts. As we pumped out in-game reactions and “match-up” posts, we also leveraged gifs to drive further engagement – featuring reactions from Landon and Mexico player Marco Fabian, and animated stickers.

To expand our reach we created TV that featured Landon and Marco to promote support for Mexico as well as our products. After Mexico’s elimination, we focused solely on promoting Affinity Cards for MNT fans – who were most likely to show their pride after the Cup was over.

Ignite: When Landon Donovan pledged his support to the Mexican National Team, the conversation took off like wildfire. Wells Fargo instantly shot to the front page and drove editorial coverage of Mexico-USA relations in the New York Times, Washington Post, ESPN, WSJ, and countless others, even international outlets including BBC, Marca, El Diario and Globo. This activity led to an astounding accomplishment: In the first week the campaign was live, Wells Fargo became the 3rd most mentioned brand in the World Cup on Twitter – following only Nike and Adidas - all without even being an official sponsor.

Engage: Wells Fargo’s Mexican National Team collection of stickers on Giphy.com reached 127 million views (based on searches) in only two weeks.

Our social content generated over 172MM impressions across Facebook, Instagram and Twitter; and, our real-time Twitter posts crushed the .31% benchmark with an engagement rate of 2.01%.

Expand our Business: Before the campaign, Wells Fargo’s promoted affinity cards averaged 279 requested per month. In 2014, at the last World Cup event, Wells Fargo drove 1005 Affinity Card requests. Between the months of June and July (that coincided with this 2018 campaign), Wells Fargo saw 30,755 affinity cards requested (22,204 Mexico cards, and 8,551 cards for all other soccer teams and World Cup designs), making a nearly 30X increase in affinity card requests over the last Cup and a 54X increase over the historical benchmark. Additionally, 2,094 other, incremental accounts were also associated with the campaign.