Why is this work relevant for Media?

Google Insta-highlights paved the way for a new form of storytelling on Instagram combining real time data integration between the world’s largest search engine and world’s largest visual lead social platform.

Background

Google search has many functionalities. One key feature is its ‘Football OneBox’ feature to showcase scores whenever a user searches for football scores. Our brief from the client was to drive awareness on the magic of Football OneBox by educating on query and feature OneBox as the one-stop place where they can get all soccer information. To that extent, our key campaign objectives were : - Target 2.5% increase in usage intent for the Football OneBox feature - Achieve 800,000 daily active users

Describe the creative idea / insights (30% of vote)

We were after the passionate football fans in Thailand. They are the ones who rely on sport aggregators and streaming sites to keep a tab on the football scores across the world. We had the uphill task of getting them to migrate and rely on Google to get the latest football scores. We had to find a way to make Google a part of their daily football consumption. Our strategy wasn’t about convincing them to let go of the sports portals. Instead we focussed on giving them a slice of our product magic when they were scrolling through their insta feeds. This way, we ensured that we got their attention without having to compete against their set football nuances. Hence our idea : Drive insta-loving football fans to use Google’s football OneBox with a real time simulation of match highlights.

Describe the strategy (20% of vote)

Thailand is a nation passionate about football. But due to living in a different time zone, most of the matches happen very late at night. Which meant that South East Asia’s most vociferous football fans missed out on the action due to this. We saw this as a great opportunity to demonstrate the power of Google Football one box. So we asked – can we actually recreate a match entirely out of search results? This was that one single most important strategic question we asked ourselves. Finding an answer to this meant that we’ve created a campaign that directly addressed an audience pain point and at the same time, highlighted the versatility of the Football OneBox. And we wanted to deliver this experience on a platform they spent a lot of time on. Instagram was that platform for us as it enabled us to launch a tech-driven social campaign.

Describe the execution (20% of vote)

Campaign: Google Insta-Highlights Using real-time match highlights and scores from the app itself, complete games were recapped on Instagram Highlights so that time-starved fans can easily get up to speed on the goals, fouls, and near-misses where they always are as soon as they're up: on their phones. Swiping up also led fans to search match odds and schedules for the next matches making Google search truly the one stop place to get all the football info you need. Because we were bringing this technology into the Instagram UX, we had to ensure that everything we did was mobile first in nature. The recreation of the matches were done using vertical video UIs to further strengthen the native platform nuances. Perhaps the greatest achievement of the campaign was that we were able to run the recreated matches by lifting real time match details via Google Search on any mobile device.

List the results (30% of vote)

As Google was promoting its latest football OneBox feature, we had the uphill task of convincing football fans why it should be a part of their daily football intake. We were up against a well established sports eco system for football right from the start. Hence we had to find a way to strike a chord with our audience right from the get go. The campaign was a hit as we scored 1.3million daily active users smashing the original KPI of 800,000. The campaign also achieved a staggering +4% increase in usage intent for the Football OneBox feature well ahead of the campaign KPI of 2.5%.