NExt Gen: the next step in Streaming
During 2020 Summer, I got the opportunity to participate in the pitch competition known as Indoor Recess*, an advertising competition where teams were challenged to create an advertising campaign centered around a problem brief.
Session 2 had the pleasure of having Twitch as the client! Serving as a mock-project manager for my team, we were able to bag the Best Strategy and Recess Monitors’ Pick for the ending awards ceremony with our final pitch.
*Note: All work shown for this pitch is spec work done for Twitch and their channel “Twitch Rivals.”
What was our client’s problem?
With Twitch as our mock-client, we were presented with a brief which detailed that streamers participating in the esports competition event known as “Twitch Rivals” were not engaging with or posting promotional materials that were meant to drive traffic to the competition livestream.
Our ask was to create an integrated campaign in which streamers would want to be a part of the process of, thus engaging and promoting the event to their audiences and beyond.
Given this problem and the ask, Team 9 was able to come up with the campaign known as Twitch Rivals: Next Gen
What makes Next Gen the solution?
We concluded that in order to get fans engaged into the event, not only would we have to focus on how to create promotion content that isn’t overly branded, but we would also have to think about which streamers to recruit for the event.
We decided to focus on the mid-tier streamer, a category of streamers ranging between 10-100k followers. These are streamers that are beginning to make their mark, a community that still engages with their fans but haven’t had the opportunity to work with big names like Twitch for official business. The opportunity to participate in a Twitch-backed event will encourage mid-tier streamers to work harder with their own content, which will encourage future streamers to build up to this monument as well.
Next Gen is the premiere event for the community to support the next generation of streamers. By rebuilding the Twitch Rivals campaign to be surrounding the mid-tier streamers, we not only create content that fans will be more interested in, but also support the community at-large. Next Gen is the next step towards building the new names in the game.
Where did Next Gen come from?
Through our research we collected, it was found that streamers tended to be disengaged with promotional materials because they realized that their fanbase were less likely to interact with heavily branded items posted by a streamer.
But that wasn’t it, digging deeper, our strategy team found that there was also a growing population of Twitch users that expressed disinterest in the big name stars on the platform. This is partly due to the streamer’s decrease in engagement after gaining a larger fanbase. With an increase in viewership comes with a smaller likelihood that the average fan will interact with their beloved streamer, whether it be on socials or through stream. Because of this, fans began leaning towards the smaller streamers, those who still interact wholly with their fanbases.
These smaller streamers provide new and refreshing content, alongside an outlet where fans feel recognized. Engagement is high between fan and streamer, which means interaction of content is higher.
Not Enough?
Check out these snazzy awards we were recognized for at the end of the session alongside our full deck below!
Special thanks to the team that made it happen!
Strategists
Eryn Burnett & Hannah Bae
Copywriters
Zachary Driscoll & Nour Nabhan
Art Directors
Joy Lu & Krista Stanley
Account Lead
Deven Sportelli
Project Manager
Bradtna Lou (that’s me, mom!)
