The Australian Open marketing playbook: how to build hype and dominate the feed - TREND SZN: Social Media and Marketing Podcast

Unpacking the Australian Open's Influencer Marketing Power Welcome to Trend Season, a deep dive into what's really working on social media and the exact strategies brands and creators are using to grow online. I'm Nat, your host and owner of social media agency Seasoned Social. Let's get into it. Alright guys, we are talking Australian Open in this episode of Trend Season. It is Australias biggest event of the year on the global scale and there are so many things happening around this event that are, you know, about brands and marketing and you know, all of those kinds of things. And I really wanted to do like a breakdown of some of the lessons or insights that you guys can learn from the Australian Open and the things that they do well and some of the things that they haven't nailed this year that have had negative outcomes. So we're going to break some of them down. You could obviously do like a 20,000 year episode on this, but I've just picked out the ones that have really stood out to me. So I'm just going to get straight into it because I don't have a lot of time today. I'm about to be travelling as you can see. If you are watching any clips from this, I mean active wear today because I just came back from the gym quite sweaty. Just had to get it done. So let's crack into it. The first kind of space that I want to talk about is the influencer space. I cannot overstate how important influences are for the success of the Australian Open and they are so aware of the role that influences play in terms of making, you know, events big and creating that hype and getting people to know about them and making them the place to be. The influencer coverage of the Australian Open is insane. And this is the lesson that I need brands to learn from these. I'm going to go through some of the examples, but the lesson here is influencers are the tastemakers, influencers are the news. You need to be working with influencers and every brand that I speak to is like influencers were part of our success. So here's some examples of what they've been doing that has, you know, leverage the influencer power. So first of all, influencers are the culture makers. They understand these. So they tell, you know, influencers are the people who tell people what's cool. They spread news about what's happening. The thing that we're seeing is that the Australian Open and all of their brand sponsors work with influencers to kind of cover the event, cover their brands at the event, all that kind of stuff. It's the fact that all of the most well known influences are at this event this week, last week, next week, all posting about it, all talking about it, making it like the aspirational place to be. They're creating this insane like FOMO and making this event seem like the coolest thing happening right now because they are all there and they are all posting about it. It's the omnipresence effect of influencers. The lesson here for brands is that when you want to launch something or make your brand cool, a lot of tastemakers who are usually influencers or content creators need to be talking about you at the same time. That's what we're seeing at the Australian Open. They actually started their influence events in December. So Australian Opens obviously early to mid January they started doing or like the brand sponsors mostly like the biggest brand sponsors started doing influencer events that were promoting the Australian Open or in partnership with the Australian Open in December. So this is part of that lead in launch campaign that's building hype around the event. Then obviously once the event actually starts, the influences are there. There's more brand events, there's more activations, you know they're on the ground, they're attending games. It's just your entire feed is now influences at the Australian Open. This is pivotal to the ongoing success of the Australian Open and it maintaining its status is like the biggest event of the year and the place to be. This is what makes that happen. It's nothing to do with the TV, it's nothing to do with traditional press. No one cares about any of that stuff anymore. It's the influences. And I don't just mean like style influences, I mean celebrities, I mean people who are well known in other kind of niches that are relevant to this. It's not just, you know, your girls in clothes. When I say influences, I just mean anyone who has an audience and influence. So we'll go through some of those examples in some of the other things that I want to talk about. How Niche Influencers Attract New Audiences to Events Also under influences they're working with niche influencers who are not fashion or sport related to kind of highlight some of the non sport activations and reasons to attend the Australian Open because the Australian Open wants to become an entertainment event, not a sporting event and they're really pushing that hard this year in particular. So for example, in opening week, we saw a lot of like food bloggers being invited down to create content around the food pop ups that were happening there. In particular, we got around like Shake Shack because that's an American, you know, burger chain that's really well known and it's kind of more niche to that foodie kind of space than some of your more generic food brands that you might see there. So we had a lot of influences like food specific influences of content creators at the Australian Open in opening week, creating content around trying Shake Shack at the Australian Open and things like that. We also saw a lot of beauty influences, particularly, you know, obviously female beauty influencers going to the Mecca pop up in opening week and showing people around and, you know, creating content around that space. Nothing to do with the tennis, but it's opening the tennis event to non sports interested people. So it's expanding the market that this event appeals to. And that's a really, really clever kind of move to make, to understand that this event can be more than a tennis and sporting event and that you can do more things and bring more people in and they will still want to come because it's the atmosphere times, the thing that they're interested in. So a lot of people are just going there to see the Mecca pop up. Do you know what I mean? Like they're not really that interested in tennis. They'll get a ground pass and go and see the Mecca pop up and just hang out. And there's so many food activations. And you know, that whole precinct that's nothing to do with the games has beautiful bars and like seating areas and so many fun things to do. So they're using influencers who are more niche to bring in other parts of the market and make it a bigger event, which is really, really clever. Capturing Authentic Moments with 'From the Stands' Content The other really cool thing that I saw them do with influencers is, and this is like really specific to social media. It's like a really fun style and format of video content to do where it's really raw. So they've done this thing called From the Stands and they've done it on both the Australian Open Socials and also Mecca have done it with their kind of influences that they've invited. So basically what they've done is they get two well known people in the crowd of an actual game. So they're sitting in their seats and then they have a camera on them and they're miked up and they just basically recording their raw conversation and then they're posting snippets of that. It may have nothing to do with the tennis. It may have something to do with the tennis. It's two people who are not tennis pros or people who necessarily have anything to do with tennis, their influences or celebs in some other realm. And I'll go through 2 examples who are just there. And I think there's so many reasons why they've done this one. It's like getting behind the scenes with well known people who you usually only see like really curated produced content of online and seeing just like what's their normal conversations to. You also get a sense of what it's really like to be at the Australian Open. Like you're not getting that heavily produced, just caught content. You know, you're seeing what it's like to be in the crowd at the game. I had another point that I just thought of and I can't remember what it was. Anyway, I'll come back to that. Oh, yeah. The other thing is it's again, positioning the Australian Open as an event for people who aren't tennis fans. So the people that they're covering are not necessarily, they don't really know tennis. And I think that's specifically the point of why they've chosen these people. So the Australian Open and Socials, they had a version with cricketer Pat Cummins and professional baseball player from America, Francisco Lindor. So two kind of sporting celebs or sporting stars from totally different realms, totally different countries. I think that's also why it's interesting is these people don't know each other. So you're like, oh, and like one of them is not from Australia, really has no idea about tennis or our culture or anything like that. So super, super interesting. So they posted a clip of Pat Cummins and Francisco Linda next to each other just having a chat. And like, it's kind of like being part of their get to know you chat, which is really interesting. Like Pat Cummins is asking Francisco questions about like, who's your biggest rivals? And, you know, how does it all kind of work? And then Francisco's asking him some questions and they're just like trying to figure out tennis stuff. And it's just like real people, relatable kind of things that you would actually talk about. The other example was a Mecca. They've done the same thing where they've macked up Annalise Darlings, who's a model, and Brooke Warren, so Shane Warren's daughter, who is an influencer. And they're just like having a chat about the tennis. But it's such an amateurs kind of commentary. Like it's the kind of commentary I would give when I got the tennis. I don't really know anything about tennis, but I'll watch it when the Australian Open is on and being like, oh, that was like such a good rally and Oh my God. Or you know, like just and then them kind of like chit chatting amongst themselves. I love this raw, unproduced style of talking content where we're essentially seeing behind the scenes. This is something that we've seen a lot in the sporting realm where they'll mic players up for like training sessions or on the field and you get to hear like actually what they're saying when they're down there, which I think we all want to do sometimes. So this is a really cool idea for brands where, you know, you mic people up to do things they were going to do anyway that you wouldn't normally create content around. People just want to watch you go about your day and see what really happens. It's this idea of like the ultimate authenticity where there's no scripting at all. There's no concept. You're literally just putting a microphone on and going about your day and filming you reacting to everything that's happening around you or conversations or whatever it is as they occur naturally. People love this type of content. So really, really good idea for you there. The Genius of the Beginning Boutique Morgan Riddle Collab OK, let's go into some brand kind of marketing insights now. So the big one that I've been watching that I think is like most relevant to you guys is in the fashion space and it's the beginning boutique Morgan Riddle collaboration collection. This has been huge and it is so clever on beginning boutiques, which is like a big fast fashion brand on their part. To give you context, Morgan Riddle is an American influencer whose boyfriend is a professional tennis player and his name is Taylor Fritz. Didn't know that. I had to look that up before we started this and just check my notes. So she's been attending Grand Slams for a couple of years. But last year at the Australian Open, she became like the most covered, you know, influencer style wise. At the Australian Open, she was in every like major media outlet covered by them. You know, she was all online. Everyone suddenly just associated her with the Australian Open. She became like the first lady of tennis. And there's been a lot of articles around that this year like, you know, what's Morgan going to wear? You know, just the anticipation of her coming to the Australian Open again, which we knew she was so beginning boutique genius move, have decided to do a collection with her and drop it at the time of the Australian Open. Now I think the obvious thing would have been to do like a tennis inspired collection, but they actually haven't done that. And I think that was a clever move for them because their audience is quite young and I really probably not connected to that Australian Open kind of vibe. So I think that was a smart move. But they've made, you know, pieces that are wearable to the Australian Open but really fit within their target audiences style and aesthetic. So here's how they've done it. They've done this collab collection with her. And then you obviously get like preview content and things like that. But what we saw was Morgan Riddle attending the game, professional kind of photography plus her UGC at the game. She's posting about the outfit and that she's wearing this from the collection and obviously she's going to get huge amounts of press coverage because she's now the first lady of tennis and like the go to style icon for the Oz Open. But also they've made sure that they've got other massive Australian based influences wearing this collection and doing the same type of on the ground style content at the Australian Open. So Sofa, Dofa, Jackie Alexander, there was a bunch more who all wore outfits from this collection, went to the Australian Open and they were getting professional photography. So they must have sent a photographer down with them. So they've got some kind of like more professional photography which they then used on the product listings on Beginning Boutique, which is so smart. And they've also created their own UGC while they're at the event, posting about it, tagging the brand, etcetera, etcetera. These are all people who get press coverage, particularly by, you know, outlets like Vogue, Daily Mail, you know, your kind of pop culture, tabloidy news, Marie Claire, all of that kind of thing. Just genius. So it's like we know that the media are going to follow them around and cover them, particularly Morgan Riddle. So these outfits are being just splashed all over the media, which then gets reshared online so much and, you know, huge amounts of eyeballs. See that kind of content. Then we have the individual influences themselves who have like millions of followers between them posting about these outfits at the Australian Open. And, you know, not only is it just like a huge amount of reach, but it's also capitalising on the cultural relevance of Morgan Riddle at the tennis, the Australian Open. You know, that in itself makes this collection really kind of high impact and highly salient right now, if that makes sense. It's you kind of need the person who's attached to the thing, not just creating the collection around the tennis and then really having a presence of your pieces being worn by known people on the ground, creating content. That's what makes this huge and so successful. I'll talk about some other, you know, we'll go into that now. Ralph Lauren's Co-Branded & Official AO Merch Strategy The other thing that brands do, I guess is they will create tennis inspired collections. We actually didn't see too many new collections come out this year that were tennis inspired. We did see a lot last year, but this year we've seen some almost like repurposing existing pieces to kind of re you know, they almost like repackage them up as if they're a new collection as a tennis collection or outfits you can wear to the tennis. So let's talk about Ralph Lauren though first, because they are a major sponsor of the Australian Open and they've created a Co branded AO specific collection that's designed for the tennis. So very preppy, very polo esque, lots of white, you know, a white kind of a line mini skirt with a little polo top. It's got the AO branding on it. Then they've got their cable knit sweaters over the shoulder very, you know, iconic, you know, rich suburban mum style is what I would probably describe it as. I'm sure you can imagine exactly what it is. And then they've obviously done a big influencer event. It will all the influences wearing the tennis collection and creating content on the ground. So I think it was one day last week that they must have done the event and just every influencer was posting at the Australian Open wearing the Ralph Lauren AO outfits. Like that was all you saw for that day. So the cool thing about this is then that regular attendees of the tennis want to wear this collection. So I've actually seen people on the street wearing both the Ralph Lauren and also just the Australian Open merch collection. So Australian Open themselves created a whole fashion line, I guess around the Australian Open. So they had tops and I think they had like skirts and things like that. Definitely lots of hats and all that kind of stuff. And I've literally seen people going for runs around here wearing their Australian Open like visors and little tank tops and things like that. So really, really clever, kind of, it's almost like merchandising a collection to leverage, just like the obsession that Melbourne has with the Australian Open. Really, really clever. And they've made it cool and less like cringe merge by getting, well, A, making it stylish outfits, not just like regular merge and B, getting all the influences to wear it and style it and make it look cool. That makes it more, you know, something that someone would actually want to buy aspirational outfits to wear. Mecca's Genius Barbie Pink Pop-Up at the AO The other brand to obviously mention is Mecca. They basically have like the exclusive beauty presence at the Australian Open. They are a big, big sponsor and they're very big in the on the ground precinct activation space. That's the space they want to dominate for the female attendees. So they created this like AI esque, like it literally looked fake when you saw it online pop up. It's this big three Storey Barbie pink. It almost looks plastic. It probably is plastic like, you know, curved corners kind of building like a full on building on the grounds at Australian Open. It's three stories of just makeup beauty. You know, you've got your mirrored makeup stations. You can try products, all that kind of thing. You can obviously buy products there. Which is so well done, made it a real, you know, experience to go there. It's not just a shop, it's very interactive, very fun visually, just so exciting to look at. And this was genius, right? This is a really smart branding move for them as well. And obviously they've been doing it for a while, so it's not like a new thing, but it's just, I'll go into the branding side of things. But I want to start with the content and why this makes them. You know, it makes sense now. Like, let me start from this point of view. It makes sense now that Mecca is there. But when they first would have done this, it would have been a really random thing for a beauty brand to go and be at a tennis event and really invest a lot into the activations there. They don't seem related. But what they've understood is that a lot of women go to the Australian Open, but maybe aren't actually that interested in the tennis and it's becoming like a bigger entertainment event over time, which they're probably a part of. They've understood that this is happening and they wanted to be the thing that women go there for. That's basically what their goal is and they're achieving it. So from a content perspective, then the fact that they have this like really crazy, almost AI generated looking pop up building has just been so clever this year. And I've talked about it already on the feed. You know, like what's happening is people are seeing it online and they're like, I just want to go to the Australian Open to see this pop up, which is basically what I did. I was like the tennis wasn't even on when we first went there, like the proper tennis. It was the opening week and I was like, I just want to go there to see the Mecca pro shop pop up because it looks crazy and it was really cool in real life. So what we then see is beauty influences really want to go and see the makeup pop up and create content around it because it's really, it's something that their audience want to see because they're seeing it online. They want to see what it looks like inside. They want the tour, they want people that they follows kind of like take on it. They wait for that content. So all the beauty influences in Melbourne are like, I want to get to the Mecca pop up. Mecca's, you know, marketing team or whichever agency they work with obviously organises a lot of, you know, they do events, then they invite people in to create that kind of content, blah, blah, blah, blah. But even if they didn't, beauty influencers would still want to do it because it has so much inherent demand from a content and culture perspective online. The other thing is like other influencers and content creators who were there and aren't really tennis fans, but they know it's like the biggest event of the year and it's the place to be. Also spend a lot of time here and absolutely make a beeline for that pop up as soon as they get there. So there's so much content being created around the Mecca pro shop pop up by female content creators and influencers. It is just completely all over everyone's feeds, particularly in opening week before the actual, you know, round one tournament begins and we start to see courtside content and things like that. This was the focus was the Mecca pop up for female content creators. And therefore, like all of your female audiences, this is what they're saying. So one of the reasons why I love these is obviously the content that's shared is just enormous. And they were featured, you know, obviously in every traditional media outlet. But also it's cements Mecca as kind of like the number one beauty brand in Australia. They are the only beauty brand at the Australian Open. And the Australian Open is our biggest event of the year on a global level that is a just a brand positioning and authority kind of play like a power move that you know, there are very few other opportunities to beat that of a year. And that is worth every cent of the bazillion dollars they would have spent on investing in that because it really does cement them in the consumers mind as the best beauty brand, which makes them the automatic go to. You can't be being like #1 in people's minds because when people are thinking, oh, I need to buy something, they will automatically go for the number one. So, you know, like if we think about Mecca in comparison to Adore Beauty, for example, you're, if the same product exists in both of those stores, your first thought is Mecca because they are #1 that's kind of how that consumer psychology works. So these are things that are worth investing in from a branding and positioning and kind of like market share play perspective because you want to be seen as the biggest, the best, the most in demand, the coolest, the most relevant. That is very, very important in terms of being the chosen one by consumers. So and the other thing I think is like associating with like Australia's most beloved event and making their pop ups really interactive and fun just creates like a really high level of positive sentiment with the consumer. And you like we all know in this day and age, there's so much, it's so quick to people are so quick to like share negative stories and feel negatively about brands and cancel brands and all that kind of thing. You really want to put money in the bank on your positive sentiment and build up this kind of safeguard positive vibes with the consumer to safeguard you against small moments of bad press and, you know, negative stories which inevitably happened. But you kind of need to keep putting coins in the bank over time that help to safeguard you against that. And things like this help to do that. It's really about serving the consumer and being being, you know, understanding the consumer, being where they want to be, making things that they love, making it all about them, which is what everyone should be doing anyway. But we don't seem to do that. But they really have understood that. OK. Repositioning Existing Products for Current Trend Relevance Oh, quickly going back to fashion brands doing tennis inspired collections, I was saying obviously the Ralph Lauren official sponsor one, but also brands like Lorna Jane were they've sort of like repurposed existing products from other collections and kind of almost created a collection. And I'm doing that in the inverted commas around the tennis where they're, you know, piercing together different items from, you know, different skis from different collections and turning it into a temporary collection. Tennis inspired. You can kind of shop that they're talking about it in their content. If you need an outfit for the Oz Open, wear these. And it's like, you know, a little mini wrap white skirt and that's kind of looks like a tennis skirt in a way, but cooler and whatnot. So, you know, then they've got their T-shirts with the kind of, I don't know how what you would call it, but almost like a vintage inspired font on it. That's just visually something you really relate to that kind of event. So that's another clever way of like not actually having to launch a collection, but repositioning what you've already got to be relevant to the thing that's trending right now. That's something that brands can absolutely leverage at any given moment. And I've talked about that before where it's like, you know, take what's happening in the news and the media and then essentially create content that positions your products within that. The Australian Open's Engaging Social Media Content Strategy Let's quickly talk about their socials because the Australian Open socials have been great. I've been loving the content. I feel like they've really understood the assignment on what they need to do to make their social content really, really engaging. So #1 they're really leaning into native styles of social content. So they're not just repurposing TV format content and posting it on social media, which a lot of sporting organisations do, sports in general, in Australia in particular, very behind on social media and you know, creating content that's engaging and understanding that the consumer needs more than just the sport to be interested. So they've really understood that and they've leaned into very native styles. So really using the portrait format, they're using editing and concepts that are specifically designed for social media engagement. So lots of zoom INS circling things, pointing things out, crisp, clear, short concepts that just tell you like one thing rather than, you know, broad generic snippets or too many highlights in one that are unrelated. Like they're really making it like, oh, I want to know how this thing ends is kind of the concept there. Short video clips with a single focus, as I just said. So they're taking their viral high impact moments, turning them into short form clips, trending formats. You know, they're doing like fun kind of trends as opposed to just talking to camera or doing like that professional presenting or professional kind of produced content, raw UGC style talking. So we talked about the miked up in the stands. That's an example of that. Just like capturing players talking about things that aren't super like their professional facade voice, stuff like that. Capturing raw moments on the court. Very much the behind the scenes story of the Australian Open I feel. Which leads me to .2, which is they're really leaning into story based concepts rather than celeb status or just game focus. So they're not worrying too much about, oh, we have to just show the biggest names and that's what people want to see it is, but only if it's interesting. They're like, where is the story happening right now? And it doesn't have to be a big story. It can be a really, really small story. But each piece of content they're kind of sharing has kind of a story in it. And I really, really love that. And I think that's making their content really engaging and making people want to come back and see what are the new stories today rather than just the very dry, boring match results stats. The really, you know, professional press conference conversations. So for example, in the press conferences, we're seeing clips that are sharing more emotional players story moments rather than them reacting to how the game went. Like I saw one recently and I was like, did this person even play a game? I don't know. All they've shared was just a really personal story that she somehow ended up mentioning in the press conference. We're not just hearing, you know, tennis match talk, which is super interesting. We're seeing like underdog moments, humorous moments. So for example, I just saw one before that was like a like it was match content, like a video clip about a match. But it was like the caption was like tennis is a funny sport. And the kind of it was just showing like I think it was a double S game and they were, you know, just in a rally or whatever. And then the end result was just like, she had to just like basically slam the ball in front of the girl's face because they were both at the net. And then they both both plays kind of laughed. And it was just like this funny moment that they acknowledged. And then as a viewer, you're like, he's such a weird sport, isn't it? And I really loved that they lent into that silliness and, you know, captured that moment and chose to share that moment rather than taking themselves so seriously and so professionally. Even though they are the biggest, you know, sporting event in Australia every year, they're not taking themselves too seriously and they're really leaning into the fun and the humour and that makes it feel so much more inviting and exciting and welcoming. And I really, really love that side of things. And then, you know, we're seeing the stories that are playing out. So obviously from a fashion perspective, Naomi Osaka had the designer Nike outfit that was jellyfish inspired and they talked about the story of, you know, it was inspired by a book she read to her daughter about jellyfish, I guess. And they really capitalised on, you know, her, the history of Naomi at Australian Open because she had the butterfly on the hat and the parasol that she had. And at one year, I don't know if it was last year, I don't know much about tennis so I don't know timelines. But one year at Australian Open, a butterfly landed on her during a game and it was a really kind of iconic captured moment. Again, like I just did a story within the actual thing that really captivated people and I think they really zone in well on story in their content rather than focusing on the big look at me ego, we're so great kind of stuff, which people are loving. The other thing that I really, really love is they're making their sponsor promotion content really entertaining. In fact, they're probably putting more effort into making that entertaining than just their regular tennis content because it needs to be. And they understand that these sponsors are sponsoring these for, you know, a reason. They want to get not just reach and association, but you know, they want to tap into that consumer love that the Australian Urban has. And they've translated that really well into their content. So they're using a lot of fun concepts and formats just to make it entertaining, not just promotional. And like take a checkbox like yes, we posted about you. Here's your logo on our feed. So for example, there was one that I mentioned in our marketing Monday found up last week that was Jacobs Creek as a sponsor. And they did like a trending kind of format where it was like 2 younger people. And they did something like, it was like captions on screen, No talking actual. But like, you know, how they do like the quotes on screen is if you're, you're reading what they're saying, it was like, do you want to go and get a wine? And then it was like the next clip, like of the other person being like, yes. And then a next clip. And they were kind of showing you around the Australian Open as they kind of had this conversation and then you end up at the Jacobs Creek, whatever. So that was just like a really fun trending kind of format that just made it a bit more interesting and felt a bit more relevant. And then another one that I saw was Chubb, which is a major partner. They're in like security and insurance and things like that. So a very dry, boring, corporate kind of brand, but they're making them fun in the Australian Open. They have like a series that they're doing every day, which is the five best moments of the day. And Chubb is a sponsor. So it's like the first thing you kind of see is like the Chubb logo with like animation around it. And then it's like the captions, like the five best moments of today or whatever it is. And they show you highlight moments of the tennis from that day, which is interesting content that people like to watch. They've merged it with the sponsorship promotion that they need to do online. So that's another thing that I think is really interesting and I think this is more about what brands should think about when they're thinking about sales. I think brands think about entertainment content as something different to sales. And this often happens when you're doing influencer partnerships. They think we're doing a partnership, we need to sell, sell, sell. The harder we sell, the more sales we get. The reality is the more engaging and entertaining the content, the more you will sell. You just figure out how to make entertaining content that also wraps your product in it. That's kind of the key at this point. So I really loved how they've done that instead of just being like doing really dry, boring, you know, formalised kind of sponsored content which we still see brands and events doing all the time. I'm like, you're not helping the partnership. Like, you want to give them the best result possible. So make it engaging, make people want to find out about this brand. Like, why wouldn't you? It's a win, win, win. It's interesting for the audience. It makes the sponsor. You know, they get better results from you and they're happy, and then you get better sponsorship deals next year. Why wouldn't you? The Pitfalls of Misleading Marketing and Press Vacuums Yeah, I think that was the end. Oh, well, there were actually a couple of negative ones that I want to talk about because this happened in the opening week and I was going to do a whole podcast on this, but I thought so many good things happened that are also great insights. I don't want to just do a -1 but there was a bit of drama at the beginning of the Australian Open because they added a new opening week that was pre tournament. The which in and of itself not necessarily a bad thing, I guess. And obviously we're going to see from the numbers that it's a very lucrative thing for them because they're really leaning into the entertainment and activations in that week. And they did get huge, huge numbers. But the problem that we found was that there was very misleading marketing and communication on that and that caused a bit of a bad taste in long time AO attendees and fans who know what to expect and we're not communicated with clearly that things had changed. So on the website and in all of their communications, they were calling it opening week, which is what they've always called round one of the tournament. But this was a new week, pre tournament and they were still calling it opening week and just selling tickets and they were matches and things happening. So people thought that this was round one and we're going onto the website, going to buy tickets and sort of being a bit like, I'm a little bit confused. Some people figured it out, some people didn't, but they felt a little bit duped. And this is something that I've mentioned a lot. You really have to be very, very careful about the fine line between clever marketing and deceiving your audience, because there is a very thin thread of trust between you and your audience that, like we sort of talked about with positive sentiment, takes a long time to build up. A lot of coins have to go in the bank to build up that trust. But if you break it just once, even in a small way, your whole Piggy Bank smashes on the ground, the trust is broken. So for me, I think it was a bit of a mistake for them not to be more clear around what opening week was. You don't need to deceive people because they actually had created an exciting and interesting enough opening week event that it was going to attract a crowd anyway. Deceiving your loyal customer in order to cash in on a new customer and more money feels greedy and people really didn't like that when they figured it out. So there is a bit of a lesson there around deception, trying to skirt around things, trying to get people to essentially spend money in a way that it's a little bit unclear what they're spending on. People really don't appreciate that. And that can break trust in a way that's very, very hard to get back and very hard to overcome. Even if you then go on to give them a really great experience. Once trust is broken, it's very hard to come back from that. So be very careful about misleading, you know, and duping people and deceiving people, even if you think it's funny. Any form of deception generally isn't received well. So this is, you know, I just had a conversation with a strategy client about using click baity titles and hooks and things like that. Like, oh, I'm about to address the rumours. Was the example that she mentioned, like should she do something like this? And I was like, honestly, I would stay away from that stuff. People really don't like being deceived and duped into taking action or putting their time and into your money into something only to find out it's not what you told them it was. That is essentially a lie. And whether or not it's meant to be funny or whether or not the thing on the other end is a positive, the lie itself breaks the trust. Don't do it is basically my advice to you. The other thing was the opening week, because it didn't have any, like it wasn't the official tournament, the Tennis News and you know, the presence of high, what am I trying to say, like really big influences and celebrities and a listers was low. So there actually was what I would call a bit of a press vacuum in the opening week. There wasn't actually a lot for the press to talk about. And that's a problem when you have a vacuum. What we tend to find is that negative things get attracted to it. So we actually saw quite a few negative stories emerge in the opening week because there was a bit of a like lack of really, really interesting positive stories because the opening week, yeah, it had matches and things like that, but they weren't actually part of the tournament, so they were kind of meaningless. So there wasn't a lot of match content to really talk about. And people were also experiencing a bit of, you know, whiplash and there was a bit of backlash against the misleading marketing of opening week. So what we saw was a few negative press stories actually come out. And they weren't even anything big. They wouldn't have even happened if we were in the tournament. But because you know, they'd essentially the the opening week of an event is the biggest press time, right? That's when all the media want to like get in, talk about it before people become bored of that thing. But because the opening week is now no longer the tournament, it's left a bit of a gap in terms of what the media can talk about and what people are interested in hearing about that don't really care about the exhibition games because they're meaningless. So we didn't really see that much content, even though, you know, I went to one of the opening week games and it was between like the world #2 and the world #7 but there wasn't really that much press on it because it was a meaningless game. And even when I was there, I felt a bit like, it's kind of meaningless. Like it's cool and I'm seeing the world #2 versus world #7 but I don't feel that like emotional. Oh my God, this is so significant because it wasn't significant at all. So there are some, you know, things to learn there about using that really, really important launch time to do things that aren't that interesting, exciting or engaging is a bit of an issue because you're leaving like you're missing out on the kind of hype and it kind of really diluted that early first week hype. So we kind of got like a little trickle and then the actual Round 1 opening week was when the biggest part of the media came out. But the fact that it wasn't at the beginning is not ideal. So I don't know what like specific message there is in there for you guys, but for me that was a really like as a marketer, I was like, oh, this is there's definitely a downside to this new opening week in terms of press and meteor and hype and excitement. It's not really the ideal way to structure an event like this. I get that financially it makes sense. But from a marketing and media perspective, I was like marketing and PR perspective, I was like, this is not an ideal thing to do at all. It's not going to affect them ultimately, but I think they will learn some things and make sure that their press coverage is covered with stories that are more positive next year. I think they will make an effort on that because I think that they would have noticed the press vacuum was attracting some negative stories this year. OK, that is it. I cannot go on any further because I have run out of breaths. Final Thoughts and Actionable Marketing Insights But I hope that was really helpful because I love looking at the way that, you know, the big, really well done kind of events and brands and things do things. And then taking insights from that and applying it to smaller brands because there's so many things to learn here. And a lot of these are translatable at smaller levels, which is exactly what we want to do. We want to make cool stuff. So hope that was helpful. If you have any questions or if there's any topics or things you want me to cover, please make sure you DM me your questions on seasoned social on Instagram. All right, guys, see you next week.