Categories Name : Web

Sub-Category : Best Benchmark Content / Branded Content

Entry Name (Campaign) : The Indian Football Story

Results

The FIFA World Cup is held once every four years. And every four years, India wonders why we cannot produce a team good enough to qualify for the World Cup. But that’s not true. We did qualify once. The Indian National Team was a world beating side. But that was a long time ago. And those stories are long forgotten. So much so, that most of India believes Indian football just isn’t, and hasn’t ever been, at the same level as the country’s beloved sport - cricket. This is why, on the occasion of the FIFA World Cup Qatar ‘22, Budweiser - a brand that celebrates football, a global sponsor for the game - decided it’s time to remind India of her rich footballing history. Budweiser connected with fans pan-India, employing research, archival footage, and interviews with sports historians, journalists, and star players Bhaichung Bhutia and Sunil Chhetri, and took merely 2.5 months to execute a 3 part docu series. To help begin this conversation, we had to first bust the biggest myth surrounding the sport - why we didn’t play the 1950 World Cup. We gave fans a glimpse of the closest we’ve ever been to a World Cup, and from here on, we used our narrative to help build the one thing every sport needs - hopeful fans.

The campaign's success speaks for itself, as it garnered a staggering:
-10M+ video views
-18M users reached
-75M impressions for the docuseries
-1.6B impressions for the brand
-44.3% average campaign VTR, with 58.6% peak VTR
-Brand Power score moved from 29.5 to 30.7
-50% share of buzz, with other global world cup sponsors such as Adidas at -15%, Hisense – 11%, Coke –3%

Its success is also evident from thousands of audiences’ responses in comments to the docu series.