Inspiring Utah Jazz fans everywhere to rally around their team by reimagining what 'home-court-advantage' means.

Starting in 2017, Nike and the NBA teamed up to celebrate their entire community, including the people and places we call home.

Client overview:

When Nike formalized their agreement with the NBA to provide all player uniforms for each of the league's 30 teams, they jointly pledged to bring significant changes to game day. Apart from using 100% sustainable materials in all jerseys, the joint partnership also included the introduction of 'uniform editions' to break from the traditional model of 'home' and 'away' uniforms. Each jersey has a unique purpose that breaks free from convention in meaningful ways in this revolutionary new model. We sought to expand the fan experience in the City Edition uniforms by creating jerseys that celebrated each team's community. Most NBA franchises represent a single city, but in Utah the team represents an entire state.

Business rationale:

City Edition Jerseys represent each team's community, and designers for the Utah Jazz have traditionally represented the community in the form of their iconic 'purple mountain' jerseys, sported by the likes of John Stockton and Karl Malone during their Finals' runs in the late '90s. However, this expression of geography only represents half of Utah's demography. In addition to the greatest snow on earth, Utah is also home to some of the world's most breathtaking arches and canyonlands. Included in the lower portion of the state are 5 national parks and 6 national monuments, all shaped out of layers of sandstone and limestone. These yellow, orange, and red canyonlands are home to hundreds of communities representing Utah's history: Past, Present, and Future. Therefore, the original 'City' Edition Jerseys became a monumental tribute to Utah's red rocks and canyonlands and the people who call it home.

Primary business objective: Broaden the fan experience as part of a sustainable growth strategy. The customer experience should generate a sense of personal appreciation and loyalty across the entire market.

Solution vision: Bringing our community to life as part of a more holistic growth strategy

Extending the fan experience through reach and connection:

• Branded experiences – Most essential to reaching and connecting with people is to stand out and support positive perceptions through the right approach to the logo, color, imagery, and content.

• Expanded media – Using expanded media to extend our reach and our fan experience across traditional and digital media

• Enhanced targeting – Pioneering innovative digital technology to target the right audiences where they are and ensure connected attribution from source to experience

Build fan loyalty, pride, and a sense of belonging:

• Jersey sales – More than earned revenue, jersey sales represent a sense of pride and belonging amongst fans.

• Season tickets – At the time, season tickets represented just 12% of total ticket sales

• Holiday plans – Representing ~10% of total ticket sales, Holiday Packages are almost as profitable as Season Tickets.

Building an active and socially responsible community:

• The Utah Jazz typically have an engaged social media presence, but this engagement rarely leads to the type of interaction that generates demand and occasionally leads to negative PR.

• 3rd party providers like SeatGeek, StubHub, and VividSeats dominated the ticket marketplace.

• Going beyond the fan experience, recruiting talented personnel to the Utah Jazz organization can depend on positive fan engagement and PR.

Bringing a community to life

The rising and setting colors of the sandstone cliffs and picture-perfect sunsets in Utah’s 5 national parks delivered the inspiration behind the City Edition experience.

Ball state logo

City edition jersey

City Edition Court

Celebrating the community: A video tribute to our fans, our community, and our home

The official reveal video came on December 20, 2017. The City Edition Jerseys' original in-arena reveal featured this video tribute to geographic monuments and rural communities based in southern Utah. From a PR standpoint, this came at a particularly opportune time for environmental preservation as one National Monument, Bears Ears, was under attack by the former Trump administration.

The video honors the fans whose passion helped define Utah's identity. It endeared the team to their community in a way they had never done before, as an authentic expression of love and appreciation.

Timing:

In collaboration with the Utah Jazz media team, we produced the “A tribute to our dance, our community, and our state (You Are Gold)” video in approximately 72 hours, from the time it was conceived to when it played in the arena for tens of thousands of fans in attendance and streaming live on NBA TV.

Music:

The National Parks is a Utah-based folk band. You Are Gold's song title, and lyrics express the organization's sentiment toward their community and home.

Principal photography

Transforming game day

The City Edition uniforms represent a connection from the court to the upper deck and beyond. It requires the right approach to connect with those fans who — 41 times per year — journey to Vivint Smarthome Arena to celebrate their team and develop lifelong relationships with them. Every touchpoint on game day must be memorable and centered on the fans.

Media campaign

Every customer touchpoint echoes our approach to gameday and facilitates memorable, identifiable, and meaningful fan experiences. We leveraged our ability to reach fans in local markets — traditionally and digitally — to acquire advanced targeting techniques and experience personalization across sites, apps, ads, and devices.

Summary:

• Outdoor

• Retail

• Broadcast: TV and radio

• Digital search and digital display

• Local online

• Digital and over-the-top video

• IP targeting

Utah Jazz online team store

Using IP targeting techniques and integrated data across ads, sites, and mobile applications, we provided personalized experiences across digital touchpoints for every user. It included identity resolution and automated decision-making to connect with users across locations and devices. Using specialized vendors, we could append data profiles from the Jazz database.

This technique uses hundreds of data points to categorize users into 71 targeted persona groups, each with its criteria for personalized experiences across the board.

Nike.com

Digital advertising and social media

Results summary

• The Utah Jazz City Edition Jersey became the highest-selling jersey in Utah Jazz history.

• Due to incredibly high demand, fans must order Donovan Mitchell's jersey through a waiting list as part of a back-order process.

• Increased season ticket and holiday ticket package purchases by 7%

• Single-game tickets that included the City Edition jersey's sold out for every remaining home game through the 2017-18 season.

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