Ogilvy Melbourne is on a mission to add baseball to the AFL, rugby and cricket crazy nation’s sporting loves list with a viral campaign for a local baseball team.
The series of television ads shows members of the Jet Couriers Melbourne Aces baseball team taking on impossible tasks to demonstrate baseball players’ sporting prowess.
In one spot a player is shown landing a hole with a baseball bat instead of a golf club, bowling with a baseball bat and catching ten hockey balls blindfolded.
The videos (all below) have been viewed more than half a million times, with those views coming from more than 190 countries.
Ogilvy Australia’s chief creative officer Steve Back said it’s hard for sports such as baseball to gain traction in Australia where AFL, rugby and cricket dominate.
“As a result, it was important to create a campaign that showed how strong, skilled and amazing this sport really is, and how entertaining the Melbourne Aces really are. By creating three TVCs that are also suitable for social media, we’ve captured the attention of sporting fans and generated plenty of discussion around whether these feats are even possible – we’d say come along to an Aces game to find out!”
The footage that made it into the final spots was altered but Back said several of the players "got pretty close" to achieving the tasks during filming.
The three 30-second spots will run on free to air and pay TV from now until the November start of the baseball season.
The spots were released on YouTube prior to their TV debut to build interest and additional awareness.
“For certain demographics it’s now vital that campaigns are created in a way that is appealing across a range of formats and channels,” he said.
“Combining traditional TVCs with social media in this campaign has given the Melbourne Aces exposure to a whole new audience that may not have been possible in the past.”
Credits: client Jet Couriers Melbourne Aces, creative agency Ogilvy Melbourne, chief creative officer Steve Back, art directors Sally Hastings, Brett Edwards, copywriters Tim Pashen, Michael Punton, TV producer Luke Coulson, senior account manager Toby Gill, exit films Brett Luderman, Corey Essey, Jeremy Flynn, fin design Morgan MacCuish, Julian Ford, Flagstaff Studio Brodie Flint, Dee Gjedsted.
