How Real-Time Digital Content Enabled Fortune 100 Companies to Spread the Message of Acceptance & Inclusion
Scenario
The Special Olympics World Games Los Angeles 2015 (LA2015) was the first World Games to be held in a major media market which presented a unique opportunity to further the organization’s mission of generating the awareness that leads to acceptance and inclusion for people with intellectual disabilities. After securing ESPN as the broadcast partner, the Special Olympics international leadership turned to our team at LA2015 to take the lead in operationalizing the mission in a new way that fully capitalized on the moment.
Challenge
While Special Olympics had chapters in the area, we were starting fresh in developing a digital audience and had 15 months after joining the organization to both gain momentum leading into the Games and develop the strategy and infrastructure to maximize Games-time coverage. Adding complication to the second effort was the scope of the event – with X athletes competing from X countries in X sports at X venues for 9 days across Los Angeles it would be the largest sports and humanitarian event in the world that year.
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#1 Seeing clear opportunities in ambiguous, dynamic environments
While we were starting fresh on digital channels, I quickly noted the access to large audiences we would have through our partnerships with ESPN, Special Olympics international, and the Fortune 500 sponsors that would be secured on the road to the Games. Rather than focus our effort on building our own digital audience, I developed a strategy to focus our effort on providing the comprehensive, real-time photo, video, and story content that would enable our partners to seamlessly distribute more content to their audiences.
#2 Building the relationships that lead to coalitions of support
Because it had not only never been done before, but was far beyond any effort made by a previous Games Organizing Committee, my Games-time coverage plan required pitching LA2015 and Special Olympics International executive leadership, communications, marketing, and operations teams to convince them of both the value and efficacy of the initiative. Leading up to the event, important relationships were built with Google volunteers to expand our internal planning operation and access to Games-time digital volunteers along with the Los Angeles Lakers photographer and team to join the effort of recruiting professional volunteers.
#3 Securing & scaling strategic partnerships
In order to secure participation from key partners including ESPN, Toyota, Google, and Mattel, I produced an in-person social media summit for the digital media teams within each company to attend at YouTube Spaces Los Angeles. During the event, we walked through the Games-time coverage plan, Special Olympics brand messaging guidelines, and most importantly got facetime with the individuals who would be owning the initiative from each company. All partners also received a Communications Guide that detailed the important points for future reference.
#4 Mobilizing teams to make sh*t happen
In addition to securing participation from partners, the logistical reality of this plan was that in order for it to work, it would require 100+ well-trained volunteers spread across X venues to execute their individual role, technology at each of the venues to enable uploading and downloading content in real-time, and a detailed project plan that kept the core team accountable to daily coverage and distribution checkpoints.
#5 Creating compelling content that connects with the right audience
Prior to the event, we engaged influencers and media partners to help spread the word about the event. As part of this initiative, I partnered with HuffPost and Olympics greats Rafer Johnson and Julie Foudy to ghostwrite a series of blog posts highlighting their Olympics stories alongside the stories of local athletes competing in the Special Olympics World Games Los Angeles 2015.
Results
Impressions
