BECU “Official Card of Sounders FC Fans” Campaign

Award of Excellence

Content Marketing — Consumer Services

Submitted By: BECU with C+C

© 2018, Public Relations Society of America, Inc. 2018 PRSA Silver Anvil Awards Entry Title: BECU “Official Card of Sounders FC Fans” Campaign Category: 2E: Content Marketing | Consumer Services & 11CA: Marketing | Financial Services Entrant: C+C and BECU Insights and Analysis BECU is a not‐for‐profit, member‐owned credit union. With more than one million members, BECU is Washington state’s largest credit union and the fourth largest credit union in the country. In mid‐2016, BECU signed a sponsorship deal with Major League Soccer (MLS) team Seattle Sounders FC to launch a new Sounders‐branded debit card. BECU asked C+C to orchestrate the launch of the card at the start of the 2017 MLS season. C+C knew it would be important to prove that BECU understands soccer fans, connect the card directly to Sounders/Northwest soccer culture, and celebrate moments and experiences unique to the soccer watching/playing community. To achieve this connection, the team conducted extensive research, beginning with an analysis of Sounders FC Fan demographics, revealing:  A narrow split between men (57%) and women (43%)  A wide range in age: 55 years + (28.9%), 35‐44 years old (20.8%), 25‐34 years old (18.5%)  The majority of fans are white (80.2%) In addition, BECU and C+C explored opportunities to stand out from the team’s large number of existing sponsors. The team dug into the culture of the Sounders FC fan base by auditing previous Sounders FC brand partnerships and researching the club’s most vocal and prominent supporter group – The Emerald City Supporters. The research revealed that the club’s match day traditions, including “tifo” banners, cheers and March to the Match are entirely fan‐run and attempts to co‐opt or interfere with these traditions by sponsors in the past has been met with criticism. To succeed, BECU would need to create a campaign with relevance to and awareness of fan culture without stepping on toes. Planning With the audience, opportunities, and risks in mind, C+C brainstormed concepts that would celebrate Sounders FC fandom and soccer culture in the Northwest, ultimately choosing to present the new debit card as the “Official Card of Sounders FC Fans,” using Sounder FC and soccer traditions to extend the concept, e.g. the “Official Card of Halftime Oranges.” To ensure the concept would resonate with fans, the team brought together a group of people with deep ties to the soccer community: soccer players (current and former), Sounders FC super fans, and parents of youth soccer players. The group helped identify universally relatable experiences from turf nubbins in your shoes to the Sounders FC Scarves Up tradition. The team then narrowed the campaign to three broadly relatable experiences that celebrated the everyday glory, fun and indignities of recreational soccer and Sounders FC fandom, each of which would be used to create social media‐friendly video ads:  The inexplicable tradition of eating oranges at halftime  The ubiquitous and unwashed “pinnies” – the colored jerseys used to distinguish one team from another during practice or recreational games  The laborious process of deciding on an outfit before going to a Sounders FC match The objectives of the campaign were:  Objective 1: Leverage the new Sounders FC‐branded card to drive 1,000 new BECU memberships  Objective 2: Drive a total of 10,000 card signups from new and existing members  Objective 3: Earn at least 250,000 social media video views for the campaign

C+C’s budget for this effort was [removed]. The project was completed within budget. Execution

Copyright 2018, Public Relations Society of America, Inc. Based on the concepts developed with fans, the team created scripts and storyboards to illustrate each storyline and guide the filming process. To maximize fan engagement, each spot starred real local soccer players and Sounders FC fans, including youth and adult recreational soccer teams. The C+C team also coordinated with Sounders FC to secure four Sounders FC stars to appear in cameo roles: Nicolás Lodeiro, one of the league’s top players; Stefan Frei, the hero of the MLS cup final (2016); and Jordan Morris and Cristian Roldan, rising stars lovingly called Jorstian Mordan for their close friendship on and off the pitch. The resulting spots were: Halftime Oranges: Based on the traditional halftime snack most U.S. youth soccer teams have at every game – oranges. This spot featured a youth girls’ soccer team and explored the question, why is it always oranges? The end of the spot features a cameo from Sounders FC forward Jordan Morris and midfielder Cristian Roldan eating orange slices. Nasty Pinnies: Based on a common (and disgusting) situation soccer players of all ages can relate to, sharing a sweaty jersey during practices or games. The spot features a co‐ed recreational soccer group from Seattle and focuses on the nastiness of the shared team pinnies, but highlights the competitor mindset of winning (and therefore forgetting how gross it is). The end of the spot features a cameo from Sounders FC midfielder, Nicolás Lodeiro reacting to a gross pinnie being tossed at him. Matchday Decisions: Every Sounders FC super fan can relate to this spot. The difficult decision of what to wear to the match. Scarf? Hoodie? Beanie? The inner dialogue for a fan weighing choices and superstitions under a time crunch is all too familiar. The end of the spot features a cameo from Sounders FC goalkeeper Stefan Frei who must decide each match which kit he will wear. With production complete, the team developed a Sounders FC fan‐targeted social media promotion strategy, reaching audiences on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube. Along with the three spots, the team developed two fan‐centered promotions to build excitement about the card: Lucky Fan: To drive engagement, awareness and card use, BECU partnered with Sounders FC to surprise fans at the Sounders FC Pro shop with $200 shopping sprees if they were seen using their BECU Sounders FC debit card. These moments were capture by a film crew and brief videos of each surprise were shared via BECU’s social channels as well as on the jumbotron at home Sounders FC games. In total, the team surprised eight fans with shopping sprees. Suite Victory: As the season wrapped up and Sounders FC prepared for their playoff run, BECU also developed the “Suite Victory” sweepstakes, where people who signed up for the Sounders FC card could enter to win a box suite for the final home game of the 2017 regular season. The sweepstakes was promoted with a social media content package for Facebook and Twitter, including still images, videos, and quizzes playing off of the “Official Card” concept. Evaluation The campaign exceeded every objective and quickly became a fan favorite, earning thousands of social engagements and comments including “Good stuff BECU,” “This is me,” and “This is cracking me up… my son’s team’s pinnies smell so bad!” Additionally, the videos also received unprompted praise from leading Sounders FC blog, Sounder at Heart, which called the campaign “close to perfection” and noted “everyone who sees this ad may not love it quite as much as I do, but I don’t think it’s possible for anyone to actively dislike it. Well done, all around.”

Objective 1: Leverage the new Sounders FC‐branded card to drive 1,000 new BECU memberships Result: During the campaign period, 12,000 new BECU members selected the card, exceeding the goal by 1100%

Objective 2: Drive a total of 10,000 card signups from new and existing members Result: During the campaign period, 60,000+ members signed up for the debit card, exceeding the goal by 141%

Objectives 3: Earn at least 250,000 social media video views for the campaign Result: The campaign garnered 271,655 views (Facebook, Twitter & YouTube), exceeding the goal by 9%