Seizing a Market

/ GORDON HAYWARD

HIGHLIGHTS

  • Worked with Gordon Hayward’s sports agency to establish him as best athlete gamer
  • Created and executed a wildly viral, gaming-oriented social media campaign
  • Extended awareness through viral engagement of national sports media personality

HIGHLIGHTS

  • Worked with Gordon Hayward’s sports agency to establish him as best athlete gamer
  • Created and executed a wildly viral, gaming-oriented social media campaign
  • Extended awareness through viral engagement of national sports media personality

When Gordon Hayward made his NBA return in 2018 from a devastating leg injury, he was welcomed back with an epic ad from Riot Games—creator of one of the world’s most popular multiplayer online games, League of Legends.

The story of how Gordon became not only known as a gamer, but as an endorsement partner for Riot and a number of other gaming companies, provides a great example of how our social media creativity can benefit our clients financially.

Best in the Game

When we launched Gordon Hayward’s digital campaign in 2014, one of his management team’s goals was to find opportunities for him within the world of multiplayer online gaming, hoping to open up an entire new marketing demographic to him.

As we explored different social media strategies, we discovered two things:

  • There weren’t many — if any — other professional athletes who played League of Legends.
  • With near absolute certainty, Gordon was far and away the best professional athlete doing it.

From that initial insight, a plan took shape.

One of the keystones of Gordon’s marketing campaign was his blog, and to that point, we had used it primarily to talk about basketball. We decided to use that fact to our advantage.

With the help of three social media images, we promoted a new blog entry entitled, “The Best in the Game.” Each image featured a provocative quote from the blog entry, and the blog itself detailed how badly Gordon would beat everyone in the NBA if he played them, even five at a time.

When Gordon Hayward made his NBA return in 2018 from a devastating leg injury, he was welcomed back with an epic ad from Riot Games—creator of one of the world’s most popular multiplayer online games, League of Legends.

The story of how Gordon became not only known as a gamer, but as an endorsement partner for Riot and a number of other gaming companies, provides a great example of how our social media creativity can benefit our clients financially.

Best in the Game

When we launched Gordon Hayward’s digital campaign in 2014, one of his management team’s goals was to find opportunities for him within the world of multiplayer online gaming, hoping to open up an entire new marketing demographic to him.

As we explored different social media strategies, we discovered two things:

  • There weren’t many — if any — other professional athletes who played League of Legends.
  • With near absolute certainty, Gordon was far and away the best professional athlete doing it.

From that initial insight, a plan took shape.

One of the keystones of Gordon’s marketing campaign was his blog, and to that point, we had used it primarily to talk about basketball. We decided to use that fact to our advantage.

With the help of three social media images, we promoted a new blog entry entitled, “The Best in the Game.” Each image featured a provocative quote from the blog entry, and the blog itself detailed how badly Gordon would beat everyone in the NBA if he played them, even five at a time.

We began with the image of LeBron, and from the moment it went up, the social media universe was sent into a frenzy. People were asking: Who the hell does Gordon Hayward think he is?

So many users rushed to Gordon’s web site to read the blog that they crashed his web site, and in turn, that poured viral napalm onto his tweet about LeBron. Within a few hours, stories about Gordon were everywhere online, and they were being shared at astronomical rates, too. (ESPN’s story alone was shared 46K times, while a ReddIt post about the story was one of that day’s hottest headlines.)

We began with the image of LeBron, and from the moment it went up, the social media universe was sent into a frenzy. People were asking: Who the hell does Gordon Hayward think he is?

So many users rushed to Gordon’s web site to read the blog that they crashed his web site, and in turn, that poured viral napalm onto his tweet about LeBron. Within a few hours, stories about Gordon were everywhere online, and they were being shared at astronomical rates, too. (ESPN’s story alone was shared 46K times, while a ReddIt post about the story was one of that day’s hottest headlines.)

The articles also detailed what the blog entry was actually about, revealing one of the most epic troll jobs in NBA history. After the first nine paragraphs of the blog, readers learned a simple truth:

Gordon Hayward was the best player in the NBA…at League of Legends.

Taking on Cowherd

A year later, it was clear that Gordon’s title was here to stay.

At the start of the 2015 NBA season, Gordon had a very public showdown with radio personality Colin Cowherd. For months, Cowherd had been poking fun at online gamers mercilessly, deriding eSports for claiming to be a sport at all. Gordon had heard enough. In response to one of Cowherd’s particularly lengthy diatribes that characterized gamers as dorks, he posted the following image across all his social media:

Once again, Gordon’s post spawned a viral response, generating numerous stories about how he had come to his fellow gamers’ defense. It culminated in an appearance on Cowherd’s radio show, where Gordon and Cowherd came to something of an understanding of just how much work being a League of Legends gamer entailed.

Ready to Get Started?

The articles also detailed what the blog entry was actually about, revealing one of the most epic troll jobs in NBA history. After the first nine paragraphs of the blog, readers learned a simple truth:

Gordon Hayward was the best player in the NBA…at League of Legends.

Taking on Cowherd

A year later, it was clear that Gordon’s title was here to stay.

At the start of the 2015 NBA season, Gordon had a very public showdown with radio personality Colin Cowherd. For months, Cowherd had been poking fun at online gamers mercilessly, deriding eSports for claiming to be a sport at all. Gordon had heard enough. In response to one of Cowherd’s particularly lengthy diatribes that characterized gamers as dorks, he posted the following image across all his social media:

Once again, Gordon’s post spawned a viral response, generating numerous stories about how he had come to his fellow gamers’ defense. It culminated in an appearance on Cowherd’s radio show, where Gordon and Cowherd came to something of an understanding of just how much work being a League of Legends gamer entailed.

Ready to Get Started?