Currys and LG set us out with the challenge to drive mass awareness of a promotional offer on LG TVs and Soundbars by tapping into one of the most culturally dominant forces in sport: football.
With TVs and their audio systems being a natural pair for watching sports (the better the visuals and sound - the more you feel part of the game and connected to your team), Currys and LG wanted to use football as a vehicle to promote an upcoming offering they would have on LG TVs and Soundbars.
They wanted to get this message across in an engaging and interesting way, specifically targeted towards football fans. Football fans are notorious for identifying inauthenticity - and they hold no punches when it comes to calling out brands for involving themselves in the beautiful game if it doesn’t feel right or native. So the execution would have to be spot on to achieve what we set out to do.
With the time of year, we identified the biggest talking point going on in the football calendar was the transfer window, and it’s all any fan on social media is talking about over the summer through to the beginning of September. Whether questioning the team they support’s activity, or ribbing rival fans for their lack of signings.
The aim was to drive as much reach and awareness of the promotion as possible.
However, the challenge was not visibility alone, it was credibility.
Football fans are famously unforgiving when brands enter their space without authenticity. Any partnership would need to feel completely native to football culture - or risk immediate backlash. So we knew we had to integrate us into a trusted football authority into the campaign in a way that felt indistinguishable from the content fans already consume daily.
To succeed, we needed to embed the brand seamlessly within football culture, not interrupt it.
Our objective was therefore to:
Rather than disrupting fan behaviour, we aimed to become part of it.
When it comes to the football transfer window - one name stands out globally from the rest. That name is Fabrizio Romano.
He’s the go-to name when it comes to transfer news and people watch his social profiles like a hawk to find out who their favourite team is signing and where their favourite player is heading.
The targeted channels were Instagram and TikTok, where Fabrizio has over 60m combined followers - so we identified straight away that by partnering with him, and with the right creative, we could achieve our goals of awareness and reach. We worked with Double Tap Content as his partnership managers to link up with Fabrizio and on sign offs etc.
After identifying the perfect partner, it was time to ideate the creative route. We worked closely with Fabrizio to co-create a script and style that would feel as natural to his regular content as possible. This would ensure that fans wouldn’t immediately identify it as an ad. So it would feel like an authentic piece of Fabrizio content, and they’d be hooked to continue to watch to find out what breaking news was about to be revealed.
The video starts with his signature “Here we go…” catchphrase and Fabrizio teases a big up and coming “deal” - leaving the audience hooked on who’s about to be announced. We timed this to coincide with some massive developing transfer stories and intentionally kept the opening generic to hook as many fans as possible into watching the video.
Then the switch up, right as we get to the announcement, we then reveal he’s announcing the promo details for LG TVs and Soundbars at Currys - still in his signature tone and in language football fans will understand.
To add a creative bonus, post copy even teased Liverpool FC fans further that this news might directly involve them.
The results were phenomenal on both Instagram and TikTok. Reaching widespread awareness and engagement.
Over 19.6 million views across TikTok and Instagram, and over 570k engagements. Some might say, the biggest news of the football transfer window.
Engagement ranged from fans tagging their rival fan friends to troll them, people playing along with the jokes - and certain fanbases driving further engagement by revealing how they were tricked into thinking they were getting great news.
The success was a testament to the team at Fabric Social, the collaboration with internal social at Currys and the LG UK team for allowing the team to get so creative with the response.
It showed how well a partnership can work with a celebrity without even needing to show the store or product, or even logos.
