Introduction
EA SPORTS is one of the most well-known brands in the industry
EA SPORTS, the sports vertical of global video games developer Electronic Arts, is a household name among sports fans across the globe, with market-leading titles FIFA, Madden NFL, NHL and UFC. EA SPORTS is an official partner of regional and global sports rights holders, including the English Premier League, German Bundesliga and Spanish LaLiga.
The Challenge
Using fan engagement to extract value from existing digital products
As an official partner of clubs, leagues and federations, EA SPORTS is awarded a package of rights and assets to help maximise the marketing and commercial performance of the organisation and its licensed titles. Each season, EA SPORTS looks to capitalise on these rights, blurring the lines between the real and virtual games, adding greater authenticity to the EA SPORTS FIFA series.
Included within the status of Lead Partner of the English Premier League is the right to market and activate the league’s official Player of the Month campaign. Previously, this simply meant getting their logo on the Premier League’s official website, where a quick and simple voting execution was embedded. It was deemed not to be delivering against its potential.
As a result, EA Sports was investigating how it could extract more value from this monthly opportunity – specifically, by promoting and linking to the game’s Ultimate Team mode.
Solution
Taking Player of the Month to the next level
As a technology company in its own right, EA SPORTS was concerned about the impact that could be felt if it was to take ownership of the rights and fall short on the delivery, whether that be a focus on security and protecting against voting manipulation, or through the overall fan experience.
Therefore it was crucial that the technology to power the next generation of the Premier League Player of the Month experience was robust, secure, and could scale sufficiently to handle a global audience of expectant fans. Monterosa / Interaction Cloud™ was the perfect fit.
With the platform having been chosen by Carlsberg to power the Man of the Match and Goal of the Round voting for the UEFA European Championships (The Euro’s) just months before, EA Sports was able to select Monterosa in the knowledge that their creative resource could be spent on the marketing rather than voting technology.
Studio, the platform’s interaction management interface, provides the team with real-time updates on how the voting experience is performing, – which informs marketing decisions, – whilst the front end Experience and back-end certification ensure a best-in-class voting experience for global fans.
Selecting a partner
A transformed voting experience
The new Player of the Month vote experience has been wildly transformed from its predecessor, which lived within the Premier League’s website.
The fan vote is now hosted on EA SPORTS’ own website at potm.easports.com in the full look and feel of the latest FIFA series, helping drive traffic to their own pages and boosting awareness of the latest releases and marketing communications.
The experience has also changed significantly. The voting element supports official video and match data integration, helping fans understand the context behind the shortlisted players’ inclusion, with new meme sharing and competition entry stages introduced to generate greater organic reach, stimulate online conversations and boost data capture.
Throughout the experience, a persistent branded clickable banner markets the latest release of FIFA Ultimate Team, attracting fans to the game’s most popular and valuable mode.
Monterosa / Interaction Cloud™ has empowered EA SPORTS to push for greater ownership of official voting rights across its other league partnerships, with the official Bundesliga Player of the Month now also available through the EA SPORTS POTM experience, with other leagues to be announced shortly.
The platform caters for this global fanbase with a location switcher, available within the solution, which makes it easier for fans to enjoy local language versions, and for EA SPORTS to add new markets of interest with little additional effort.
Results
Delivering on EA SPORTS’ goals
The POTM vote has helped EA SPORTS take greater ownership of its partnership rights to deliver some amazing campaign results against a backdrop of a new secure, robust and engaging fan experience:
10m+ votes
7 minutes average dwell time
10% data capture entries
228 countries reached
Launching the new Player of the Month experience in the FUT branding, and on their own easports.com domain, delivered on their annual objective to blur the lines between the real and virtual games, helping blend FIFA features into a real-world environment, whilst also integrating real-world moments and reveals into the game.
EA SPORTS’ access to the wider range of Experiences powered by Monterosa / Interaction Cloud™ has inspired the team to release further deployments across their activation calendar, including their FIFA World Cup predictor campaign (engaging more global fans than the official FIFA version), Premier League Team of the Season reveal, and Premier League Team of the Year selector beats.
30m+
Votes
7mins
Average dwell time
"Monterosa has helped EA Sports truly take our Premier League Player of the Month sponsorship to the next level. The results have been superb, transforming the voting experience for our players, whilst EA Sports FIFA has become an integral part of the real-world football conversation."
James Taylor
Football Partnerships Lead, Northern Europe, EA Sports
