What’s the recipe for successful short-form content from live events? Making good use of the community to create viral videos - after all, the community itself knows best what it wants to talk about (and listen to). We followed this principle for the Meet at Rift footage, where we worked with members of the Riot Games community to create content for the client's social media.
Over the course of two Meet at Rift events in Łódź, we managed to record 6 videos, which together generated more than 300,000 views on YouTube Reels. The client’s strategic goal was to use the videos to showcase the event and the vibrant Riot Games community to a wider audience. Wanting to keep the short-form content feeling when creating the videos, we focused on several pillars that allowed us to successfully meet the objectives while generating high reach.
CELEBRATING DIVERSITY
One of the most important insights we picked up at the very beginning of our work on the creative side of things, was to understand how diverse the community is. From professional players or coaches to cosplayers to casual enthusiasts of all four Riot Games. When approaching ideation of the videos, we had to assume from the start which part of the community we wanted to highlight and how to create conditions to engage all of them at the same time.
INFLUENCERS
Without them, we certainly wouldn’t have been so successful. Mixing unknown community members with influencers allowed us to increase the potential for virality. An encouraging hook with a well-known face is a great introduction to the video, and the chance to participate in a film side by side with your idol is even more motivation to appear in the footage.
FRESH IDEAS
Simple as that. There are no high-reach social media posts without good content ideas. In our case, we focused on formats that would give the community a chance of having their say. Following this approach, we tested the community’s knowledge of the first season of Arcane just before the release of the second, asked for beliefs and opinions (including a polarizing question about favorite/best skills in the game), and gave those who like to express themselves visually a chance to present their work. Cosplayers greeting us “in character” or building the ultimate LoL character composed of any skill set were original ideas that performed very well on social media.
MONTAGE
We turned hours of footage into just a few minutes of ready to publish videos. Dynamic editing of the short form, is already a standard in the video industry, but in our case there is also a proper selection of footage, as well astaking into account the branding of the client. By spicing up the videos with game elements such as emoticons, character portraits and lines of dialogue, we were able to successfully combine a dynamically and emotionally charged montage with the Riot Games vibe.
At the end of the day, what matters most is the satisfaction of the client, who not only appreciated the great displays, but most importantly trusted us enough to make additional coverage of live events one as one of the main elements of the channel’s strategy. In addition to the two editions of Meet at Rift (we are looking forward to the next one!), we were also active at least during the LEC media days, or the Arcane Meeting Factory in Warsaw.
