Twitch Rivals

Creating an integrated campaign aimed at increasing Twitch Rivals viewership in the Indoor Recess ad competition for the Session 2 client, Twitch.

Disclaimer: All work done in this case study are speculative ideas and designs submitted to Twitch Rivals, specifically for their Twitch Rivals Minecraft show.

My Roles

Art Director

UX/UI Designer

UX Researcher

Tools

Figma

Zoom

Team

Amanda L. (Art Director)

Amy N. (Project Manager)

Maggie M. (Account Lead)

Olivia R. (Strategist)

Sabrina V. (Strategist)

Tabitha B. (Copywriter)

Tony W. (Art Director)

William P. (Copywriter)

Timeline

2 Weeks

Let's start by building the context, block by block.

Indoor Recess is an ad competition born out of the COVID-19 pandemic to provide young, talented individuals without internships the chance to work on a project and be mentored by advertising professionals. For Summer 2020, Indoor Recess hosted 3 competition sessions, each with a different client ask.

I applied and was selected to participate in Session 2 as an Art Director, but also incorporated my experience in UX/UI. The client was Twitch Rivals, a big gaming competition show on the Twitch live streaming platform that brings popular streamers together to compete for cash prizes.

So, what's the problem?

Fans want to view their favorite streamers and content creators on Twitch Rivals, but encouraging streamers to organically promote the shows has proven to be difficult.

Leading us to figure out how might we...

Create an integrated campaign leading up to the Twitch Rivals Minecraft show, leveraging streamers as the main way to create hype around the competition, and increase engagement with the campaign to maximize viewership of the actual show.

Alright, game on... but what was our creative roadmap like?

User Research

From our initial research of users on Twitch, we found that:

Screen Shot 2020-10-04 at 2.33.37 AM.png

65%

of Twitch viewers are male

Screen Shot 2020-10-04 at 2.33.53 AM.png

55%

of Twitch viewers are between the ages of 18-34

Screen Shot 2020-10-04 at 2.34.17 AM.png

~1/3

of all Twitch viewers have not found a fandom they feel they belong in, but desire to

Screen Shot 2020-10-04 at 2.33.45 AM.png

35%

of Twitch viewers are female (and increasing!)

Screen Shot 2020-10-04 at 2.34.03 AM.png

~1/2

of all Twitch viewers watch gaming streams more than they play the games themselves

Screen Shot 2020-10-04 at 2.39.14 AM.png

~70%

Although the U.S. is still the biggest market for Twitch in the world at ~30% viewership, this means that

of the rest of the viewership is comprised of viewers from across the world

Meet Jordan (aka CaptainSparklez), Mike, and Natalie

We then researched many popular Twitch streamers who we were informed might be participating in the Twitch Rivals Minecraft show. After our initial findings, we dove into researching the audiences and fan bases of these shows/streamers.

Passionate Creators

Avid Viewers

Potential Viewers

We found that streamers are relatable personalities, and fans are die-hard viewers who are deeply invested and loyal to their favorite creators. Both streamers and their fans want to communicate and engage with one another in supportive and authentic ways.

Ideate and Event Flow

And then the lightbulb flashes on... with our insight!

Fans and creators want to feel like they belong, so they desire to engage and form connections to build community together.

How would this culminate into a viable campaign?

The strategy is simple: Let fans join the story.

And the big idea?

Introducing...

What better way is there to increase engagement, viewership, and hype up the Twitch Rivals Minecraft shows than by hosting The Block Party, a pre-show extravaganza built by fans, for fans? Everyone is welcome to join in on the fun.

How does The Block Party work?

Fans tune in to The Block Party 3 days before the Twitch Rivals Minecraft show to watch the reveal of which streamers will participate in that show. Then, various crazy challenges and mini-games will be played during The Block Party to display the streamers' personalities, while viewers can vote in polls, unlock emotes, and change the games by typing commands into the chat.

Fans and viewers will also be able to gain a sense of agency in the making of the Twitch Rivals Minecraft shows by submitting Minecraft objects that they've created to the Creative Competition, and/or Bingo card challenges to be featured in the Minecraft shows. The winners whose Minecraft objects and/or Bingo card challenges were selected by the Twitch team will be sent exclusive prizes and merchandise.

Pre-Show (The Block Party) Event Flow.pn

Creative Executions

The Block Party visuals honed in on a 'glitchy' themed vibe and the website prototype is comparative to existing Twitch and Twitch Rivals website screens. We wanted to stay on brand, but with a bit of our own twist.

*The interactive website prototype for The Block Party can also be viewed here.

Other neat things we kept in mind:

Since this project brief asked for an integrated campaign idea with a $20,000 budget, the details of our proposed media plan and budget breakdown were done for this project as well.

We'll also measure the success of this integrated campaign idea with select key metrics.

Screen Shot 2020-08-19 at 3.03.37 PM.png

Lights, camera, action!

And if you're interested in watching the presentation we submitted to Twitch Rivals, let's thank modern technology for that.

View Pitch Deck

In summary...

Logging off with final thoughts and reflections...

Thoughts

This was such a fun experience—probably one of the best projects I've ever had the pleasure to work on so far!
Clients don't always know what they want until they see it—so while you may think that your ideas are great, it can always be a hit or a miss
Trust in the feedback that you receive from your mentors—they have your best interests at heart and will vouch for you
Although we didn't win in a category within the competition, my team and I were still so incredibly proud of ourselves for accomplishing so much in such a short time!

Next Steps

More user research
Interview and survey actual Twitch Rivals viewers
Continue ideating and iterating on wireframes
User testing to gain better insights

Special Thanks

Mentors: Daniel E., Stephanie M., Shokou O., and Moshe I.
The team at Indoor Recess! (Y'all really are the real MVPs of 2020 for making this competition happen!)

Twitch Rivals

Creating an integrated campaign aimed at increasing Twitch Rivals viewership in the Indoor Recess ad competition for the Session 2 client, Twitch.

Disclaimer: All work done in this case study are speculative ideas and designs submitted to Twitch Rivals, specifically for their Twitch Rivals Minecraft show.

My Roles

Art Director

UX/UI Designer

UX Researcher

Tools

Figma

Zoom

Team

Amanda L. (Art Director)

Amy N. (Project Manager)

Maggie M. (Account Lead)

Olivia R. (Strategist)

Sabrina V. (Strategist)

Tabitha B. (Copywriter)

Tony W. (Art Director)

William P. (Copywriter)

Timeline

2 Weeks

Let's start by building the context, block by block.

​

I applied and was selected to participate in Session 2 as an Art Director, but also incorporated my experience in UX/UI. The client was Twitch Rivals, a big gaming competition show on the Twitch live streaming platform that brings popular streamers together to compete for cash prizes.

So, what's the problem?

Fans want to view their favorite streamers and content creators on Twitch Rivals, but encouraging streamers to organically promote the shows has proven to be difficult.

Leading us to figure out how might we...

Create an integrated campaign leading up to the Twitch Rivals Minecraft show, leveraging streamers as the main way to create hype around the competition, and increase engagement with the campaign to maximize viewership of the actual show.

Alright, game on... but what was our creative roadmap like?

User Research

From our initial research of users on Twitch, we found that:

65%

of Twitch viewers are male

55%

of Twitch viewers are between the ages of 18-34

~1/3

of all Twitch viewers have not found a fandom they feel they belong in, but desire to

35%

of Twitch viewers are female (and increasing!)

~1/2

of all Twitch viewers watch gaming streams more than they play the games themselves

~70%

Although the U.S. is still the biggest market for Twitch in the world at ~30% viewership, this means that

of the rest of the viewership is comprised of viewers from across the world

Meet Jordan (aka CaptainSparklez), Mike, and Natalie

We then researched many popular Twitch streamers who we were informed might be participating in the Twitch Rivals Minecraft show. After our initial findings, we dove into researching the audiences and fan bases of these shows/streamers.

Passionate Creators

Avid Viewers

Potential Viewers

We found that streamers are relatable personalities, and fans are die-hard viewers who are deeply invested and loyal to their favorite creators. Both streamers and their fans want to communicate and engage with one another in supportive and authentic ways.

Ideate and Event Flow

And then the lightbulb flashes on... with our insight!

Fans and creators want to feel like they belong, so they desire to engage and form connections to build community together.

How would this culminate into a viable campaign?

The strategy is simple: Let fans join the story.

And the big idea?

Introducing...

What better way is there to increase engagement, viewership, and hype up the Twitch Rivals Minecraft shows than by hosting The Block Party, a pre-show extravaganza built by fans, for fans? Everyone is welcome to join in on the fun.

How does The Block Party work?

​

Creative Executions

The Block Party visuals honed in on a 'glitchy' themed vibe and the website prototype is comparative to existing Twitch and Twitch Rivals website screens. We wanted to stay on brand, but with a bit of our own twist.

*The interactive website prototype for The Block Party can also be viewed here.

Other neat things we kept in mind:

Since this project brief asked for an integrated campaign idea with a $20,000 budget, the details of our proposed media plan and budget breakdown were done for this project as well.

We'll also measure the success of this integrated campaign idea with select key metrics.

Lights, camera, action!

And if you're interested in watching the presentation we submitted to Twitch Rivals, let's thank modern technology for that.

In summary...

Logging off with final thoughts and reflections...

Thoughts

This was such a fun experience—probably one of the best projects I've ever had the pleasure to work on so far!

Clients don't always know what they want until they see it—so while you may think that your ideas are great, it can always be a hit or a miss

Trust in the feedback that you receive from your mentors—they have your best interests at heart and will vouch for you

Although we didn't win in a category within the competition, my team and I were still so incredibly proud of ourselves for accomplishing so much in such a short time!

Next Steps

More user research

Interview and survey actual Twitch Rivals viewers

Continue ideating and iterating on wireframes

User testing to gain better insights