Comms lessons from the London OlympicsNovember 8th 2012

Alex Balfour

(former) Head of New Media, London 2012

@alexbalfour2012 www.alexbalfour.com

AgendaAgenda

The contextThe journeyOur Games-time ambitionOur achievement

3

• 204 Olympic teams; 164 Paralympic

• 10,490 Olympic athletes; 4,200 Paralympic

• 20,000 media

• 70,000 volunteers

• 200,000 Games-time workforce

• 11 million tickets

• 170+ venues

• 26 Olympic Sports, 20 Paralympic

• Over 800 events leading to medals

The Games –scale

AgendaAgenda

Journey to 2012 video

6 July 2005London wins the right to stage the Games

AgendaAgenda

The contextThe journeyOur Games-time ambitionOur achievement

“London 2012’s new media channels will be the number one way for the public to access, share andparticipate in the 2012 Games “

2006: New Media vision

• Huge demand for websites from all consumer facing divisions of the business education, volunteering and later online shop, ticketing and licensing

• Became clear that new media could not, and should not, drive each department’s objectives, only support them.

• New media put aside the metaphorical “magic wand” - which much the rest of the business was ready to believe it had - and took up the air traffic controller’s paddles.

• New, simpler, strategy emerges – delivering digital channels that focused on efficiency, supported communications and where possible enabled data collection

2007-8: New Media strategy evolves

User data

Sign

ups

RevenueMessages

New media products and services(enablers that help the business do things better and cheaper)

2007-8: Simplified new media strategy

911/04/2023

• By 2010 majority of pop. in UK and many other nations had access to broadband

• London 2012 consumer transactions become digital by default.

• The new media team commissioned and managed, in whole or part, 77 digital products, sites or services in 6 years including:

London2012.com, Get Set (education site), School leavers site, Pre-Games training camp venue site, velodream competition, Gamesmaker (volunteer) site and sign up platform (with Atos), Torch relay site and map, Torch relay nominations platform, London Prepares site, Memorabilia auction site, Online shop (with ecommera), Mobile site, Recruitment sites (ODA and LOCOG), Local leaders site, Event database and front end site, Mascots site, Learning legacy site, Festival 2012 site, #1yeartogo Twitter visualisation, Young Gamesmaker site, Ticket sign up, Ticketing site (front end html only), Open weekend site, Travel advice for business, Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, Google Plus, Flickr accounts, “Join In” App on 3 platforms...  

Digital by default

• Major communications/business milestones supported by new media initiatives including:

• Online quiz to educate would-be volunteers

• Facebook apps for torch relay and paralympic ticketing launches

• New sites for Mascot and Festival launches

• Live Twitter Q and A for Olympic ticketing

• Competitive tweeting activity for 1 year to go

2009- New media activations a core part of comms campaigns

As of 30 April

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr10,000

100,000

1,000,000

Newsletter Volunteer Applications Tickets EOI Facebook London 2012 Twitter London 2012

Ticketing interest launch

23 March 2010

Volunteering EOI launch

27 July 2010 Volunteering General launch15 Sept 2010

Ticketing Price Announcement

15 Oct 2010

Competition Schedule and Ticket's Prices Announcement

15 Feb 11

Ticketing Sale Date

Announcement15 Jan 11

2010-11: Growing digital fan base for direct communication

1211/04/2023

2012: Social and mobile on the march

zurmat.com

2.7bn social media accounts worldwide by start of 2012

Q6 Do you currently use a mobile phoneQ7 Which brand of mobile phone do you currently use? If you won more than one mobile phone, please response for your primary mobile phone, meaning the phone which you

use most often.Q8 Now, we’d like you to identify the model of your [brand] mobile phone. You may use these images to help you.Q144 (For undetermined model) May I know if your current primary mobile phone has the following features> Touch screen, QWERTY keypad, Able to do any application

installation and usage, able to connect to internet

– Smartphone penetration in United Kingdom is 61%

61%

Base: All Qualified Respondents (n=1025) Base: All Mobile Phone Users - regarding the phone most often used (n=1607)

2012: Social and mobile on the march - UK

17th November 200914

Clay Shirky, Here comes everybody

2012: Social and mobile on the march – second screen

AgendaAgenda

The contextThe journeyOur Games-time ambitionOur achievement

We set out a vision in 2010 To be the most visited Gamestime website ever

comprising:

1. Ultimate authority on the Games with comprehensive, unbiased provision of results;

2. A 'sense of live' that provides greater access to the event wherever the user is;

3. Appealing to all audiences, irrespective of location, ability, age, background, and level of sporting knowledge;

4. Encouraging people to interact and engage with the inspiring stories of the Games.

5. Generate revenue (target confidential, sorry chaps)

Our Games-time online ambition Back then mobile seemed secondary!

AgendaAgenda

The contextThe journeyOur Games-time ambitionOur achievement

We set out a vision in 2010 To be the most visited Games-time website ever

comprising:

1. Ultimate authority on the Games with comprehensive, unbiased provision of results;

2. A 'sense of live' that provides greater access to the event wherever the user is;

3. Appealing to all audiences, irrespective of location, ability, age, background, and level of sporting knowledge;

4. Encouraging people to interact and engage with the inspiring stories of the Games.

5. Generate revenue (target confidential, sorry chaps)

Our Games-time online ambition

Games-time traffic: Most visited Games-time channels ever

0

5,000,000

10,000,000

15,000,000

20,000,000

25,000,000

30,000,000

35,000,000

Total VisitsOf which through mobile devices

• 432m total visits from 109m unique users across web and mobile

• 60% of visits from mobile devices

Games-time traffic: Most visited Games-time channels ever

• 30m total visits from 9.5m unique users across web and mobile

• 52% of visits from mobile devices

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1000000

2000000

3000000

4000000

5000000

6000000

7000000

8000000

Visits

Start of Paralympic Games

Games-time traffic: Mobile app downloads (cumulative)

01-Jul 08-Jul 15-Jul 22-Jul 29-Jul 05-Aug0

5,000,000

10,000,000

15,000,000

20,000,000

Official London 2012 Join In App

15m mobile application downloads, #1 ranking in 7 countries

Games-time traffic: Mobile app downloads (cumulative)

0

5,000,000

10,000,000

15,000,000Official London 2012 Join In App

5.8m upgrades to Paralympic versions of both Apps

Games-time traffic: by hour of day weekday

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 240

100,000

200,000

300,000

400,000

500,000

600,000

700,000

800,000

Desktop

Mobile web

Apps (phone)

Apps (tablet)

Wednesday 8th August

Games-time traffic: by hour of the day weekend

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 240

200,000

400,000

600,000

800,000

1,000,000

1,200,000

1,400,000

Desktop

Mobile

Sunday 5th August

We set out a vision in 2010 To be the most visited Games-time website ever

comprising:

1. Ultimate authority on the Games with comprehensive, unbiased provision of results;

2. A 'sense of live' that provides greater access to the event wherever the user is;

3. Appealing to all audiences, irrespective of location, ability, age, background, and level of sporting knowledge;

4. Encouraging people to interact and engage with the inspiring stories of the Games.

5. Generate revenue (target confidential, sorry chaps)

Our Games-time online ambition

2611/04/2023

• No rights to video - huge focus on what works best on the web: schedules, medals, results and complementing TV viewing

• Live results from 7,000 heats or phases

• Country pages for 205 nations

• Profile pages for 10,490 athletes

• 5,000 images and 100 stories a day

• 15,000 non-sport events

• 1,043 torch community runs mapped, 8,000 torch bearer profiles even including twitter accounts

Ultimate authority

We set out a vision in 2010 To be the most visited Games-time website ever

comprising:

1. Ultimate authority on the Games with comprehensive, unbiased provision of results;

2. A 'sense of live' that provides greater access to the event wherever the user is;

3. Appealing to all audiences, irrespective of location, ability, age, background, and level of sporting knowledge;

4. Encouraging people to interact and engage with the inspiring stories of the Games.

5. Generate revenue (target confidential, sorry chaps)

Our Games-time online ambition

• People from 201 territories countries visited the website

• People from 155 countries used our apps

• 40% of all online Britons visited the web site as did 29% of all online New Zealanders, 19% of all online Canadians, 12% of all online Americans#

• Paralympics : 50% of visits from UK, 7.43% US, 4.88% Aus, 3.2% France

Appealing to all audiences - reach

United States United Kingdom

Canada France

Australia India

Germany South Korea

Spain Italy

Malaysia Mexico

Japan New Zealand

Philippines Russia

Netherlands China

Belgium Argentina

Ireland Iran

Switzerland Thailand

Truly global reach Top visiting countries (web)

• Average Olympic visit times/page views per visit (ppv):• Web: 8 min 34s average visit time / 8.26 ppv (5m6s/ 6.89ppv Paralympics)• Apps (mobile): 23 ppv• Apps (tablet): 29 ppv

• 4+ star ratings for both Apps across all platforms and thousands of positive reviews

“just like the Olympics as a whole, BRILLIANT!”

“oh so good”

“great stuff. Essential”

“great app. Even I can use it”

“Brilliant app I used to inform my TV viewing”

Appealing to all audiences - retentionThey came, they stayed

We set out a vision in 2010 To be the most visited Games-time website ever

comprising:

1. Ultimate authority on the Games with comprehensive, unbiased provision of results;

2. A 'sense of live' that provides greater access to the event wherever the user is;

3. Appealing to all audiences, irrespective of location, ability, age, background, and level of sporting knowledge;

4. Encouraging people to interact and engage with the inspiring stories of the Games.

5. Generate revenue (target confidential, sorry chaps)

Our Games-time online ambition

Interact and engage: social media followers

Source: Google Analytics

0

1,000,000

2,000,000

3,000,000

4,000,000

5,000,000

FoursquareGoogle+TwitterFacebook

4.7m social media followers

Interact and engage: Facebook• 1.86 m Facebook likes, 8 Facebook accounts

• London 2012 content reached 49m facebook users at peak, 43% under 24

• 100m+ likes across all Olympic athlete and team pages according to Facebook

• Full open graph integration with celebrate and support buttons on site – 200k users logged in with their Facebook credentials with 1.4% click thrus from their posts back to London2012.com

• We provided an experimental feed into Facebook so 100 athletes could feed their results onto their pages

Interact and engage: Twitter• 1.9 m Twitter followers -150m tweetsAbout the games (acc to Twitter)

• 48 Twitter accounts:• 36 sport accounts with live feeds• 2 mascot accounts • 6 twitter cameras with personality:

@L2012BballCam @L2012GymCam @L2012TableCam@L2012StadiumCam@L2012MatCam @L2012PoolCam

• Visualisations:• Olympic and Ceremony Pulse• #supportyourteam

Interact and engage: Twitter – london2012.com/olympicpulseLive tweets from across 40 venues and during ceremonies

Interact and engage: Twitter – #supportyourteam1.55m tweets for 204 teams on desktop and mobile, and 50k for Paralympics

Mongolia, inspired by their tweeting prime minister, took top spot!

Interact and engage: Google + and Youtube• 818k Google + followers

• Unprecedented Google Plus global “events” for opening and closing ceremony – 5k people took part

• 1.1m views of “Rock the Games” (4:1 Live:VOD) on youtube.com/london2012 - live performances and Q and A filmed in London of Rizzle Kicks, Mika, Noisettes, Lawson, Conor Maynard and others

Interact and engage: Tumblr•

http://exploretheceremonies.tumblr.com/

• Backstage blog live during opening and closing cermonies

Interact and engage: Location based• 60k Foursquare followers, people from 120

countries check in to special Olympic and Torch Relay badges

• 627k Facebook check ins to 40 venues

• Over 10m location-based push location- based mobile push messages sent to all ticketholders in stadia including exclusive ceremony photos, spectator surveys and information

• Around 60% open rates for push and around 60% of app users had location enabled

• 4,000 mobile spectator surveys completed

Push message sent to app users as cauldron was lit

Interact and engage: QR codes

• QR codes on key spectator publications/leaflets

• 95k scans, mostly on day of events and mostly from paper ticketholder spectator guide (1.2m sent), 0.6% activation rate

• 3.5k scans from outdoor media, mainly shops

Interact and engage: Games• 4m visits to the Mascots’ games site –

www.london2012.com/mascots, 150,000 online mascots created

• Official mobile game – over 6.5m downloads and #1 seller in UK

• The Official Video Game has been the number 1 selling game in all formats

• Over 17m page viewsacross mini games

Interact and engage: Mobile• 66,000 rang a digital bell on the Join In

App to welcome the Games on July 27th

• Tap and shake the Join in App for an “easter egg”: 6 different dancing mascot animations

• Notifications for chosen event start times, chosen country medals and daily medal table summary

Interact and engage: Music• Opening ceremony album, Closing

ceremony album:

• #1 digital download in many, many countries

Interact and engage: Email

• 83 million emails sent to 200 countries, with 17 daily editions• 13 million email opens, 5 million links clicked• Content targeting – 150 permutations:

• GB and non-GB editorial iterations• Medal table and start times highlighted

based on country supported/favourite sports• Daily regional event listings, based on users

postcode (UK) and targeted merchandise offering based on preferences

• Unparalleled accessibility, featuring large text, high visibility and dyslexia friendly email versions as well as links to BSL content

Interact and engage: Samsung Paralympic bloggers

• 50 Leading Paralympic athletes used a Samsung Note to blog live• Purpose-built App and backend ingests

video, audio and phone calls – fully accessible and used by blind and visually impaired athletes

• Assets moderated on back end and republished on youtube.com/paralympicsporttv

• Athletes notified of publication so they can share via social media

• 500 videos created• 200,000 video views

We set out a vision in 2010 To be the most visited Games-time website ever

comprising:

1. Ultimate authority on the Games with comprehensive, unbiased provision of results;

2. A 'sense of live' that provides greater access to the event wherever the user is;

3. Appealing to all audiences, irrespective of location, ability, age, background, and level of sporting knowledge;

4. Encouraging people to interact and engage with the inspiring stories of the Games.

5. Generate revenue (target confidential, sorry chaps)

Our Games-time online ambition

And finally…a word of thanksWithout these organisations on our side this couldn’t have happened

And of course our magnificent staff and volunteers...

The official Emblem of the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Ltd is protected by copyright. © London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Ltd 2007. All rights reserved.

Thank you

Thank you

Alex Balfour Consulting –.alexbalfour.com

@alexbalfour2012