5 lessons from Nike’s Euro 2016 social video campaign that can #sparkbrilliance for your brand

The Burst Insights squad had a team huddle this morning for a team talk on our favourite Euro 2016 social video campaign. Given the tournament success of underdog’s Iceland and Wales, there was a clamouring for us to champion a new king of social video content. After a few hairdryers were thrown and an incident with an orange slice, it was decided that Nike with the irrepressible Cristiano Ronaldo leading the line, was still the team to beat, from the list of brands we’ve been analysing throughout the tournament. Only a handful of brands can compete with Nike’s marketing kitty, so what are the social video lessons that ALL marketers can take from their Euro 2016 performance?

#1 The Extra Time Boost of Extended Social Ads

Nike was 1 of 4 brands we found (out of 25 analysed in total during the first two rounds of Euro 2016 group games) to create an extended version of its TV ad for its social media platforms. Clocking in at 6 minutes, the longer social form of “The Switch” has been watched over 51m times on YouTube, liked 67k times on Facebook and shared 9k times on Twitter.

The full 1 minute TV ad was pushed out across the same channels above, as well as Instagram. Compared to the extended social video, the TV ad has been watched 1.6m on YouTube, which represents just 3.25% of the extended social video audience.

Take a social first approach and use other media formats, such as the broadcast appeal of TV advertising, to drive awareness and traffic to richer social content. It can be an alluring call to action for consumers to be one of the first people to share ‘mini movies’ with their social peer groups.

#2 Sweat your video assets

Nike produced 3 short teaser videos for ‘The Switch’ under 15 seconds — posted across Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube — before the tournament started, which is ideal viewing time for consumers on mobile devices with short attention spans.

The inclusion of England players wearing their official England Nike kits in social version of the ad, also resulted in an England GIF featuring Harry Kane (who fronted campaigns for Mars and Beats by Dre). Nike used the GIF on Twitter in response to related tweets by @nikefootball followers.

Human attention spans are now thought to be 8 seconds, which is less than a goldfish! So pre-plan how your video assets will work as thumb stopping short teaser content on platforms like Twitter and Facebook, where your competition for attention is fierce and you have to earn eyeballs, completed views and video post engagement on longer considered pieces of video content.

#3 Your hero content doesn’t need to worship your product

It was reported that Nike’s 2014 World Cup #riskeverything campaign saw them overtake adidas as the world’s biggest football footwear brand in nearly all the major global markets, including Germany. It’s no surprise to see then that Nike’s #sparkbrilliance campaign is geared towards selling shoes.

However, Nike knows that a product advert is not what is going to score big with fans. It is 2 minutes and 55 seconds into the extended social ad before you first see a glimpse of Ronaldo in the Nike’s new Mercurial Superfly V boots.

Nike’s video strategy has been to surround their hero content with product specific assets. It produced 17 different ‘Spark Brilliance Moment’ animated videos — all under 18 seconds in length — that promote 1 of 4 boots in the sport manufacturer’s latest product range. 13 different players are name checked in the video titles, despite some not featuring, in animated form, during their video.

Nike also has a rich history of creating mobile app games around its set piece events. It launched the Nike Football app in the run up to the 2014 World Cup. For Euro 2016, the app has been given a ‘Pro Genius’ training theme overhaul. The free app is a pure marketing tool, featured 7 times on the iTunes homepage and 53 times in iTunes, according to App Annie. 6 social ads, featuring 5 players and 1 manager, were created to promote the latest incarnation of the Nike Football app.

Include short content that sweats your assets, using social video and other marketing mediums to reach as many consumers as possible. Creating a cacophony of content around your main marketing mission is the best way to impact consumer purchasing intent.

#4 Experiment with different content experiences

Mobile apps can be time and budget consuming, often going unseen without the influence of app store promotion from Apple and Android. There’s now an increasing variety of ways to engage your audience through social video; the one that’s got most marketers excited is 360 degree video. YouTube rolled out 360 videos in December 2015 and Facebook followed suit on the eve of Euro 2016.

Nike delivered its first 360 video as part of the #sparkbrilliance campaign that makes for essential viewing, whichever angle you look at it. The video camera puts you in the middle of a locker room at halftime, as Turkey national team captain (and all round Nike ambassador) Arda Turan delivers a rousing speech to his team mates. The video, supported by a second video in a more traditional format version, generated mass international media coverage.

If you are going to experiment with 360 video in your next campaign, it’s a good tactic to stick to a simple execution, in a controlled environment. Focus on the narrative (either visual or scripted) that you are trying to tell, using the 360 visual element to tell a more immersive story.

#5 Influencers deliver instant interest

Nike in many ways are the brand embodiment of Cristiano Ronaldo; a high profile football demigod that you would expect to see putting in a blockbuster performance at a big tournament. Euro 2016 has been true to form for both the player and his main sponsor brand.

Of the 17 animated ‘Spark Brilliance Moment’ videos posted to the Nike Football YouTube channel, the one featuring Ronaldo was watched 82,000 times — double the viewers of the second most watched video in the series.

Identify the social media influencers that matter to your target audience. For every Cristiano Ronaldo lined Nike budget — Ronaldo has 225m followers across the 4 social media platforms we analysed — there will be a suitable influencer of a suitable size and cost that speaks to your target customers.