Nanjing 2014 Youth Olympic Games: Global Digital Marketing Campaign Inspiring Youth Through Sports and Social Media
The Olympics represents the pinnacle of international sporting events, symbolizing a spirit to inspire and motivate the youth in the world to strive for the best. It seeks to build a better world through friendship, solidarity and fair play. With this full understanding of the Olympic mission, We took up the task as the integrated digital marketing partner of the Nanjing Summer Youth Olympic Games in 2014. The Games were held on 16-28 August 2014. Over 3,000 young athletes from over 200 countries participated. Our objective was to connect the Nanjing Youth Olympic Games with the global audience through an integrated digital marketing and public relations campaign. We set out to inspire tens of millions of young people around the world to participate in sports and live by the Olympic values.
The Nanjing 2014 Youth Olympic Games is an all-encompassing campaign that requires a highly coordinated O2O (online-to-offline) marketing and public relations strategy. Meticulous planning and strong project management skills are integral to the success of the campaign. Our integrated services of social media, digital advertising, Video and KOL marketing, public relations, media events, news publication, and crisis management were mobilized. The task required not only a creative and experienced team but also a dynamic team with global vision and a strong global network. We organized our global network to oversee the production of multi-language press releases and the coordination of news publication and media events on the global stage. The campaign called for creative and vigorous marketing efforts to inspire youth communities throughout the world.
Further to being the ultimate multi-sporting event, the Youth Olympic Games highlighted the energy and dynamism of youth. We connected themes of the Nanjing Youth Olympic Games and the global young audience with creative simple gestures such as “1,2,3, YOG!” along with a selfie, and “1,2,3 YOG Dance” which demonstrated youth and the Olympic spirit. Social media played an unprecedented role to engage with young audience worldwide. We carried out active marketing campaigns on the “6+1” platforms of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, Google+, Pinterest plus YouTube. We set in motion a stream of creative and engaging content across social media platforms. Leveraging on our extensive reach on social media, we created a series of fun and interactive videos featuring the Nanjing 2014 mascot LeLe to generate buzz.
Our integrated digital marketing campaign for the Nanjing Youth Olympic Games was an unprecedented success. The impact of our social media strategy was far-reaching. The #YOGselfie campaign reached over 400 million people in the first 24 hours after the International Olympic Committee President mentioned it at the Opening Ceremony. Over 56 million people in China have posted #YOGselfie and 147 million #nanjing2014. The social media pages of Nanjing Youth Olympic Games across all platforms generated over 400,000 followers and the total number of posted and interactive comments reached over 20,000.
