| Title | ALERT SHIRT |
| Brand | FOXTEL |
| Product / Service | FOXTEL SPORTS PACKAGE |
| Category | A05. Use of Other Digital Solutions in a Direct Campaign |
| Entrant | CHE PROXIMITY Melbourne, AUSTRALIA |
| Entrant Company | CHE PROXIMITY Melbourne, AUSTRALIA |
| Advertising Agency | CHE PROXIMITY Melbourne, AUSTRALIA |
| Production Company | WEARABLE EXPERIMENTS Sydney, AUSTRALIA |
| Name | Company | Position |
|---|---|---|
| Leon Wilson | CHE Proximity | Executive Creative Director |
| Sam Harris | CHE Proximity | Copywriter |
| Tom Wenborn | CHE Proximity | Art Director |
| Sam Maguinness | CHE Proximity | Head Of Digital Craft |
| Tom Lear | CHE Proximity | Digital Designer |
| Diego Trigo | CHE Proximity | Technical Director |
| Tony Chilvers | CHE Proximity | Head Of Interactive Planning |
| James Needham | CHE Proximity | Head Of Brand Planning |
| Susan Lyons | CHE Proximity | Head Of Customer Experience Planning |
| Elizabeth Bierre | CHE Proximity | Senior Account Director |
| Shannon Mason | CHE Proximity | Senior Account Manager |
| Josh Armstrong | CHE Proximity | Senior Account Manager |
| Richard Taylor | CHE Proximity | Head Of Digital Creation |
| Di Nash | CHE Proximity | Head Of Tv Production |
| Ben Moir | Wearable Experiments | Co Founder |
| Billie Whitehouse | Wearable Experiments | Co Founder |
| Ed Smith | Foxtel | Executive Director Of Sales And Marketing |
| Jesse Stephens | Foxtel | Head Of Acquisition Marketing |
| Emma Lambourne | Foxtel | Acquisition Marketing Manager |
| Tara Langtry | Foxtel | Acquisition Marketing Executive |
Australian Rules Football is a national obsession. As a result, fans already get great coverage of football games on free-to-air TV. For the last two years Foxtel, Australia’s largest subscription television broadcaster, had sent a personalised DM piece to the member base of each Australian Rules Football club with modest success. Those who hadn’t signed up in previous years were unlikely to do so given the offer was actually more expensive than in past years. We needed an idea that would engage fans in a new way and make them evaluate Foxtel’s Fox Footy channel with fresh eyes.
Rather than just say Foxtel gets fan closer, we created an experience that proved it. A world-first in wearable technology, Alert Shirt literally connects fans to the game, allowing them to feel what players feel live as it happens. The shirt works with a phone App that captures real-time game data and sends it via Bluetooth to electronics inside the shirt. Here it is converted into powerful sensations that simulate the live play. What started as a DM brief expanded to become a commercial product, supported by a campaign of videos, street posters, social media, a dedicated microsite and PR.
With no new product features to talk about and an audience who had already heard Foxtel’s message three years running, our objective was to rise above the rational sales pitch and connect fans to their team in an emotional way that free to air TV couldn’t. By targeting football club members and loyal Foxtel fans we aimed to spark a positive conversation about Foxtel that would spread to the broader football community. To reach our audience we sent members a personalised, club-themed DM pack and seeded our campaign idea on club Facebook Pages with online videos starring their captains.
4,000 shirts were produced to connect new subscribers and existing valued customers to their teams. In the first week of launch, Alert Shirt reached 2.1 million people through Facebook, created 400,000 Twitter impressions and received 135,000 video click-throughs - not bad for a country of just over 20 million people. Beyond the Australian football community, the conversation took off globally, attracting news coverage from Delhi to Detroit including Sky News, The Wall St Journal, Mashable and Contagious. But most significantly, we’ve changed the rules of broadcast television, transforming professional sport from something you watch to something you’re physically involved in.