In my last post, I made it clear that social cannot be used solely for sales.
However, when you can bring them together, it’s a nice marriage that pleases both creative and commercial teams.
This approach was best summed up when Aston Villa’s media and content department announced Tyrone Mings as the sixth signing of the summer transfer window of 2019/20.
Mings was the player that fans desperately wanted to join after a successful loan spell that saw the club promoted back to the Premier League.
With news from the hierarchy that the defender was set to sign permanently, I pitched the idea of revealing him at a train station.
Why? Mings famously partied in his kit after the Wembley win and was photographed catching the train back to his home in Bournemouth – still in his shirt – much to the delight of supporters.
I’d seen the ‘digital noise’ that had been created after this viral image – and wanted to make it reverberate even further.
That was the creative element sorted – but what about the commercial angle?
Announcing his arrival on the Thursday, the marketing team were going on pre-order with the yet-seen, new Kappa kit the following Friday – and intelligently saw an opportunity to combine the reveal of signing with shirt.
It was a challenge to rush Mings up to the Platform 1 of Witton Station – and back again! – without being spotted.
But solid train time calculations – and a willing participant – ensured the shoot was completed successfully.
The video on Twitter achieved 3.6k retweets and 12.2k likes while Facebook had 6.6k likes and 3.2k shares.
The marketing team were also thrilled with pre-order numbers in the following week, with the ‘Mings factor’ helping ensure a 200% uplift on the previous year’s figures.
This was a solid campaign that showed what can be achieved with proactive, united collaboration.
Paul Brown 