CANNES YOUNG LIONS 2016 - MEDIA

PLAY FAIR. PLAY TO WIN. A BETTER SPORTING FUTURE

TESS MCBRYDE & THOMAS DAVIES

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PLAY FAIR. PLAY TO WIN.

CHALLENGE

Sport is unpredictable. Sportspeople are volatile.

It’s an experience fundamentally grounded in aggression, enthusiasm and passion.

For both participants and spectators, sport is a key outlet for emotional and competitive energy that they cannot

release in their day-to-day lives. Where else is it acceptable to scream at the top of your lungs, or even physically

try to hurt another person?

For people of all ages, sport is a way of escaping from things seeking to control our conduct1. This means “Play

Hard, Play Fair” needs to engage an audience who is at best disinterested, and at worst openly opposed to its core

ideal.

“Fair play” is another level of control in an environment based on

pushing boundaries.

1 Ostrowsky (2014) ‘The Social Psychology of Violent Behaviour Among Sports Spectators’ in Aggression and Violent Behaviour

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INSIGHT

The underlying fact is that this is a behavioural change program targeted at people who don’t perceive a major

problem with their current behaviour2.

Yes – we know that violence is wrong. Yes – we prefer if everyone plays by the rules. But none of that detracts

from our overwhelming need to make ourselves feel good by beating other people3.

When it comes to winning, we like to be aggressive. We like to be over-competitive and scream blue murder from

the sidelines. Most of all, we’re not going to embrace an external control to our sporting behaviour just because

other people tell us that it’s wrong4.

Australians understand the need for fair play,

but competitive aggression is tied to the nature of sport.

As such, engagement mechanisms need to be structured to offer personal benefits rather than societal benefits;

short-term gratification over long-term emotional growth. It’s not about changing current behaviours – right now,

we don’t actually need to. That comes later.

Rather, it’s about using these behaviours to construct an engaged, targetable audience that the wider “Play Hard,

Play Fair” campaign can begin to persuade.

2 Ostrowsky (2014) ‘The Social Psychology of Violent Behaviour Among Sports Spectators’ in Aggression and Violent Behaviour 3 Wann (2000). ‘Controllability in the Self-Serving Attributions of Sport Spectators’ in The Journal of Social Psychology 4 USADA 2012 True Sport Report

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STRATEGY

Make “fair play” a competitive sport.

This audience will be built through tapping into the very fundamental nature of sport – the spirit of contest. Using

News Corp’s existing sport assets as a platform, participants will compete in the sport of fair play for immediate,

real world rewards.

Trying to directly attack a culturally entrenched behaviour would be both costly and time consuming. The barriers

are too large to do this efficiently.

Instead, we’ll combine reward psychology, competitiveness and comparison to heroes as a way to funnel the

sporting public towards places where they’re more receptive to the “Play Hard, Play Fair” ethos.

THIS PROCESS OCCURS THROUGH THREE CORE ELEMENTS:

First, we’ll reframe the sports fan’s competitive energy by captivating them with prizes and incentives. At this

point, we’re not trying to teach them anything – we’re simply tapping into their combative nature with another

avenue for winning.

Next, we allow them to release this energy in a desirable environment, using the mechanism of assessing “Fair

Play” to compete against peers, rivals and heroes.

Finally, we tangibly and frequently ladder out rewards across clubs, schools and individuals to reinforce fair play

and generate strong engagement with News Corp assets – subsequently collecting extensive data for greater

targeting of the wider brand campaign.

Reframe Release Reward

PLAY FAIR.

PLAY TO WIN.

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EXECUTION

ENGAGEMENT

Approximately 913,200 children aged 5 – 17 in Australia play a football code5. In order to reach them, our

execution is grounded in extending functionality of News Corp’s social sport platform, Fox Sports Pulse.

FOX SPORTS PULSE

Families with kids aged 2-11 years of age account for 35% of the Fox Sports Pulse audience6. As Australia’s largest

grassroots sport network, will we adapt this platform to embed a “Play Hard, Play Fair” rating within results of all

youth football activity.

5 ABS Physical Activity Data, 2012 6 Fox Sports Pulse Base Proposal

Engagement Competition Results

PARTICIPANTS

2.2 MILLION

40,000 GAMES PER WEEK

CLUBS

22,000+

180,000 TEAMS

PAGE VIEWS

78,706,000

869,000UNIQUE AUDIENCE

GENDER SPLIT

56.4% MALE

43.6% FEMALE

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Launch awareness is easily built by News Corp’s vast scope:

EDM • News & Metro Masthead subscribers

Widgit• Permanently housed on digital properties

• Geo-targted updates

Social• "Play Hard, Play Fair" leaderboard

• Facebook, Twitter & Instagram accounts of News properties

Print • "Play Hard, Play Fair" banners across sport print

In-App• Update messaging Pulse, introducing the "Play Hard, Play

Fair" extension

Talent• Mentions by columnists/presenters - assessing fair play of

professional athletes

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COMPETITION

WHERE WILL THIS RATING COME FROM?

With protection of officials shaping as a

growing movement in junior sporting leagues7,

we’ll appeal to governing bodies and tap into

this trend by empowering referees to

determine fair play winners.

Through the Pulse extension, the referee will score each team’s fair play

as either GOOD or BAD after a match – a rating that will permanently

appear on the results for that fixture and is shareable through in-built

social functionality.

Once this rating system is in place, teams will be ranked on a ladder of

fair play and incentivised with prizes, with rewards ranging from discount

coupons (school canteens, retailers, etc.) to training sessions with

professional athletes.

To be eligible for these prizes, mandatory sign up to the “Play Hard, Play

Fair” pledge will be required.

As 81% of Australians use their smartphones via home Wi-Fi8, the Pulse

app will automatically update upon network connection, immediately

serving 869,000 existing users with a mechanism to become a pledgee.

7 The Sunday Telegraph, 2016 8 ACMA 2015 Communications Report

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RESULTS

Data generated from the “Play Hard, Play Fair” extension will provide News Corp with the #1 data source on

grassroots sport behaviour, which can be used to fuel content across owned assets.

Just imagine the headlines.

As well as news, “Fair Play” rankings can be published,

with content distributed across the print and online

Metro Mastheads – taking the message right into the

parental domain. These channels will drive

incremental awareness over time, prompting parents

to find out more about the pledge and wider

campaign.

This data also allows for custom audience targeting for

precise amplification of the “Play Hard, Play Fair”

message. If there’s an issue with on-field violence in

the U15 South Central Coast AFL Division, News Corp

will be the first to know and can deliver targeted

messaging accordingly.

Whilst the football codes represent an ideal target for launching this campaign, this idea has future scope to

transcend sports, giving every young Australian athlete a chance to come out on top in the contest of fair play.

Participants

Social Content

DataBroadcast

Content

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A BETTER SPORTING FUTURE

KEY ASSET INVOLVEMENT

Fox Sports Pulse Core platform

Reward delivery

Data collection

Metro Mastheads

Amplification

Tailor-made content

Incremental reach

Fox Footy – NRL Fox Footy – AFL

Amplification

Tailor-made content

Incremental reach

Through this media execution, fair play doesn’t become another level of unwanted control.

Instead, it’s a new avenue for competition.

Our plan is simple AND measurable. It generates results AND exclusive data. It benefits sport AND it benefits News

Corp.

But most importantly, it accomplishes all of this without telling anyone that their behaviour is wrong.