Campaign: Shark Week
Objective
For an NHL team in the middle of the summer, there is a lull between the schedule release and training camp where it’s hard to create a lot of buzz around a team. However, working for the San Jose Sharks, we were presented with a unique opportunity to organically build buzz and tap into the fanbase during the summer doldrums.
My goal became to tap into the cultural phenomenon that is “Shark Week” to build awareness around the team and drive traffic towards the website, which gives our sponsors higher impressions.
Process
With this being an annual campaign, I aimed to bring the same combination of whimsy and facts consistently year after year while tapping into content themes that were present the year prior. Simply put: I became an expert on all things sharks, whether the animal or the hockey team or the stray pop culture reference.
Execution
Using a combination of research, design skills, and the team archives, I would create daily content for the entirety of Discovery Channel’s Shark Week.
Some of the content would be resources for fans - such as launching an official Giphy account or creating a new Spotify playlist - or interesting historical media - like the original pregame introduction or an article on the team name.
Results
Through this offseason content effort, we were able to drive an increased amount of traffic to the website, which gave our team sponsors an increased number of impressions. In addition, this gave us an opportunity to test new platforms, series ideas, and resources that can be continued into the season where there’s less free time to brainstorm net new ideas. Plus, it was such an obvious tie that it would have been a miss if we didn’t do it.
