Title	SEARCHING FOR TOTTENHAM
Brand	SVENSKA SPEL SPORT & CASINO
Product/Service	STRYKTIPSET
Category	F04. Social Behaviour & Cultural Insight
Entrant	PERFECT FOOLS Stockholm, SWEDEN
Idea Creation	PERFECT FOOLS Stockholm, SWEDEN
Media Placement	PERFECT FOOLS Stockholm, SWEDEN
PR	PERFECT FOOLS Stockholm, SWEDEN
Production	PERFECT FOOLS Stockholm, SWEDEN

Name	Company	Position
Charlotte Zetterström	Perfect Fools	Client Lead
Patrick Dry	Perfect Fools	Creative Director
Michael Davinder	Perfect Fools	Producer
Petter Träff	Perfect Fools	Planner
Daniel Berg	Perfect Fools	Copywriter
Karl Nord	Perfect Fools	Art Director
Mirjam Krook	Perfect Fools	Designer
Joakim Ohlssson	Perfect Fools	PR Manager

Why is this work relevant for PR?

Based on cultural insights about football fan culture, the campaign tapped into, and stimulated, an existing social behaviour among the target audience. “Searching for Tottenham” managed to engage football fans all over Sweden, a target audience notorious for being suspicious towards brand’s involvement in the football fans community. The campaign sparked the fan’s love for their clubs, and a healthy rivalry, to convince over 100 people to try to legally change their names to match that of their favourite club and was covered by news outlets all over the world.

Background

Swedes are crazy about English football. But as the end of the season approaches and the league is pretty much decided, interest declines. And when it does, so does betting on Sweden’s most popular betting pool – Stryktipset. Our task was to come up with a creative idea that would spark the interest for English football among the target audience and remind them what supporting a football club is all about – love and rivalry. With the objective to strengthen Stryktipset’s brand among the target audience and increase their interest in betting on Stryktipset all through the end of the season, we set out to find a way to grab the attention of and engage football supporters all over the country.

Describe the creative idea (20% of vote)

Swedish fans are passionate about English football. Sometimes so much that they officially change their name to match that of their favourite club. In the spring of 2019, there were Arsenals, Manchesters, Liverpools and many Chelseas represented in the Swedish official records. All of the top clubs… but one. Therefore, we launched “Searching for Tottenham” – a campaign built around finding Sweden’s first person to legally change his or her name to Tottenham. Fans were asked to send in their name changing applications to the Swedish authorities, and supporters of other clubs were encouraged to participate as well. The three fans that gave us the best and most passionate story were picked out by a jury to win a trip to see their club play live, travelling to the UK using a passport that literally expressed their passion.

Describe the PR strategy (30% of vote)

The interest in english football declines in Sweden towards the end of the season among our target audience, men 18-59 with a big football interest. Our strategy focused on highlighting the passion for a club rather than the possible results in the finishing gameweeks. Our insight was that passion takes a lot of different expressions, and one type of expression stood out – legally changing the name to match that of one’s favourite club. We targeted sports and local news outlets to reach our target audience with stories about those hardcore name changing fans. Through the stories, we reminded them about what passion for football really is about – and inspired new fans to take the name of their favorite club. Every name changing application sent in carried a story to pitch to media, creating new opportunities throughout the campaign to increase interest.

Describe the PR execution (20% of vote)

We created a campaign site that explained the initiative and offered a guide as to how to complete an application to legally change your name to the club in one’s heart. We located a few fans who already had changed their names to Arsenal and Manchester United and pitched their stories to media, as well as featured them in social media video content, to spark the interest for the campaign. During the two weeks of campaign time, we pitched new stories as the applications came in via our site. We then pitched the winners, chosen by our jury, to different media outlets. On social media, we got fans of different teams to compete about who was the most passionate. As the Swedish authorities approved applications to most clubs, but declined the application of Sweden’s first Tottenham, we turned the news into a “David vs Goliath” story that got worldwide attention

List the results (30% of vote)

The campaign received worldwide coverage with over 100 positive articles, was covered by all key media in Sweden and earned a reach of over three times the population of the country (over 30 million reach). The campaign spiked the interest for Stryktipset and increased the purchase intent with 140%. The overall liking of the brand increased with 26% among the target audience, highlighting the fact that we managed to tap into their interests in a non-intrusive and appreciated way.

Please tell us about the social behaviour and / or cultural insights that inspired your campaign

We found our insights in an existing social behaviour among the fan community and accelerated that behaviour through our understanding of the core drivers in football fan culture. Swedes express their passion for football in both odd and marvelous ways. When we learned that there were a few Swedes who has taken their passion all the way into their passport, we soon realized that these manifestations of love had the potential to earn attention both in the media and in the Swedish fan community. And as a big part of being a fan is comparing yourself to fans of other clubs, we brought a competitive component into the campaign to trigger the rivalry among fans and further increase engagement and attention.