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Success Story: UFC & User Engagement

Posted Jan 14, 2021

With all the things we have going on in our lives, sometimes we forget to slow down and celebrate the wins we’ve gained through hard work. In this new series, we are highlighting our valued clients’ outstanding mobile campaigns and their success stories. Looking to build awareness for an upcoming fight, UFC teamed up with AdColony to create an interactive mobile campaign. Using AdColony’s advanced technology and creative expertise, UFC’s campaign achieved impressive and award-winning results.

The Challenge

In the ever-competitive sports industry, the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) needed to fight for users’ attention and get them excited about their highly anticipated pay-per-view fight between champion Robert Whittaker (also The Ultimate Fighter: The Smashes welterweight winner) and undefeated interim champion Israel Adesanya. The campaign’s objectives were to drive awareness and engagement for UFC 243 in order to increase pay-per-view buys and ticket sales. The campaign needed to appeal to MMA fans as well as individuals who frequent sporting events.

The Solution

AdColony created a custom mobile video campaign using Aurora™ HD Video technology and a Dynamic End Card to reach sports fans and event-goers. The campaign’s exciting video content and the interactive hotspots allowed UFC to drive both top of the funnel awareness around the event as well as direct user engagement.

The user was presented with high-quality clips using Aurora™ HD Video from the fighters’ previous events while interactive hotspots popped up for optimal engagement. These hotspots allowed MMA fans to interact with the ad and learn more about both of the fighters. After the video, a Dynamic End Card was shown which had more hotspots leading users to UFC-related links and driving more engagement and of course, excitement! 

The Results

By utilizing AdColony’s mobile video technology, UFC was able to achieve great exposure for their UFC 243 event. Through HD Video and a Dynamic End Card, viewers were not only given key information but were also able to interact with the video to increase their own excitement, resulting in a tremendous campaign. The average video completion rate was 94%. Overall engagement was 23%, more than 5x our benchmark. Using a MOAT integration, viewability measured was 98%.

The success of the campaign earned several finalist positions at global award shows and recognition from MMA Smarties North America where it won a Bronze Award in the Mobile Video Category. With AdColony’s expertise, UFC’s campaign drove brand awareness, user engagement, and hype for the fight, making it an undisputed champion.

“AdColony is a great partner that continually pushes the envelope with mobile well beyond what we can achieve with the usual channels. Together we created an exciting and engaging campaign and we’re proud to have won an award for our collaboration.”

Kristen Bankosz, VP of Content Marketing

About UFC
Ultimate Fighting Championship is a premium global sports brand and the largest pay-per-view event provider in the world. Headquartered in Las Vegas with offices in London, Toronto, Sao Paulo and Singapore, UFC produces more than 40 live events annually that consistently sell out some of the most prestigious arenas around the globe. UFC programming is broadcast in over 156 countries and territories to more than 1.1 billion TV households worldwide in 29 different languages.

Join the Conversation
Success Stories highlight brands and publishers’ outstanding mobile campaigns and how they used AdColony’s technology to achieve impressive results. Do you have a success story to share? Tweet us at @AdColony. For the latest AdColony mobile news and updates, follow @AdColony on Twitter, like us on Facebook, or connect on Linkedin.

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