BOSTON, TD Garden – The next generation of fans are consuming sports and entertainment in new ways, and that’s challenging stakeholders to adapt their strategy for a chronically online demographic.
Nearly half of Gen Z viewing happens on a smartphone, and young adults are increasingly getting their sports content from social media to the tune of 74%, more than any other generation. That social consumption usually comes in the form of highlights, clips, and online interactions with athletes. It’s a big reason why the NBA has a gigantic digital presence – today’s younger fans are tuned in online.
The more we learn about the consumption habits of young adults, it’s clear that the content isn’t the problem, but the delivery. They might care about a sport, but you have to meet them where they are and on their entertainment level.
Ahead of the 2024 NBA Playoffs, we teamed up with Basketball Forever and its audience of 110 million to develop culturally relevant content at every step of the postseason. The partnership sought to reach internet natives through animated shorts, nostalgic design, and short-form spots geared for digital channels. Importantly, it also made storytelling a key piece of the content strategy.
Rivalry’s Global Head of Marketing Grant Flannery was focused on “making sure we’re showing up in the places our audience is already at, and making content they’re interested in,” adding that it was critical to “be a part of the conversation” rather than hard sell your audience.
The campaign coincided with the release of our NBA Same Game Combos (SGC) feature, tying it to the groundswell of the postseason itself. Flannery says that timing made it feel like the campaign was launched specifically for the new product, and drove a record spike in basketball SGC wagers in May as a result.
On the content front, Rivalry and Basketball Forever focused on turning around multimedia that was fresh and timely with each development of the NBA playoffs story and the conversations happening around them. This approach did mean that the real-time content being developed might not be published depending on the game outcomes, but it was necessary to quickly tap into unfolding storylines.
Our first series pitted LeBron James and Nikola Jokić against one another in an 8-bit, video game-like environment. These digital motifs were seen throughout the campaign, and played to our advantage as an instantly recognizable aesthetic for under-30 customers.
Not only did the short-form, social-focused content sit well with our target audience, but it was paired with the betting vernacular and CTAs needed to convert.
As the Boston Celtics sealed their 18th NBA Championship, our campaign broke records of its own. According to ComScore, we reached more than 19 million unique users across the globe, including over 4 million video views and 1.7 million total engagements.
Basketball Forever CEO Alex Sumsky puts it down to the fact that “Rivalry gave us the freedom to cook.” He added that over the June-July period, it ranked as the 19th best-performing campaign out of around 5,500 major brands engaging with sports globally.
Within the betting segment, the campaign ranked #1 in engagement among branded content on Meta platforms, driving almost 230,000 actions – more than four times the second-placed brand.
