The inaugural Sony Ericsson Xperia Hot Shots campaign came to an end over the weekend with the winning Xperia Hot Shot being revealed exclusively online to the 823,328 Facebook fans that have supported the campaign over the past 6-months. The reveal takes place days before the start of the US Open in Flushing Meadow.
With a WTA world ranking in the top 35 after making this year’s Wimbledon semi-final, Sabine Lisicki took the coveted prize, and in doing so won a €100,000 support prize from Sony Ericsson. Tennis fans had voted for their favourite and most entertaining Xperia Hot Shot on the official Sony Ericsson Facebook page (www.facebook.com/xperiahotshots) with Sabine claiming the most votes to win.
Sabine Lisicki said: “Being an Xperia Hot Shot has been the best thing that’s ever happened to me! My highlight of the campaign has got to be meeting David Guetta. I can’t thank all of my fans and Sony Ericsson enough for their amazing support throughout the whole campaign – I wouldn’t be here without them!”
The competition was launched in March in Miami with Maria Sharapova, where the six rising stars of the WTA were unveiled as the Sony Ericsson Xperia Hot Shots. Sabine battled it out against fellow world-class tennis players Bethanie Mattek-Sands (USA), Heather Watson (UK), Alize Cornet (France), Sorana Cirstea (Romania) and Dominika Cibulkova (Slovakia).
The competition followed the six players as they realized their dreams on and off the court, through exclusive access to the worlds of music, film, gaming and fashion. Fans could follow their lives through the Sony Ericsson You Tube channel and Facebook page. Over the course of the campaign the Sony Ericsson Xperia Hot Shots competition has generated huge awareness including:
· 823,328 friends on Facebook
· 3 Million video views on You Tube
· 140,000 downloads of mobile app
· 1200 pieces of media coverage
· Over 70 videos produced
· 530 hours of footage shot
The campaign was created by Sony Ericsson to raise awareness of its state-of-the-art Xperia smartphones and to amplify their sponsorship of the WTA. The tennis players communicated with their fans through social media platforms using their Sony Ericsson Xperia smartphones and the campaign helped strengthen Sony Ericsson’s position as the communication entertainment brand. Secondly the campaign aimed to raise the profile of all the Xperia Hot Shots and lastly it was produced to give fans unique and exclusive access to their heroes.
Not only was the campaign a success off the court, the Xperia Hot Shots saw their rankings soar as well as their profiles this year. Germany’s Sabine Lisicki saw her ranking go from 220 when she was chosen as an Xperia Hot Shot to her current position of number 22 in the world, reaching the semi-finals at Wimbledon along the way. Heather Watson moved in to the top 100 for the first time in her career and Bethanie, Sorana and Dominika also saw a rise up the rankings while being an Xperia Hot Shot.
Sony Ericsson ambassador Maria Sharapova commented on the success of the campaign:
“I’ve worked with Sony Ericsson for a few years now and they have always done really interesting things with their sponsorship of women’s tennis. This campaign has been fantastic in bringing to the fore some of the less well-known players on the Tour. The support that I’ve received from Sony Ericsson over the years has helped me enormously in my career and it’s been great to see how the six Xperia Hot Shot girls have really benefitted from the increased exposure and amazing opportunities that this campaign has given them.”
Stephan Croix, VP and Head of Global Marketing and Partnerships added:
“As Xperia Hot Shots wraps up, it’s great to look back at a very successful campaign for Sony Ericsson. Being known for our innovation in Smartphones, we have always been keen in driving innovation with our tennis sponsorship and we believe we have done that with the Sony Ericsson Xperia Hot Shots campaign. The insight we started with – that people have a desire to get closer to the real personalities behind the sport – has proved true and so the behind the scenes format of the web-based TV show has proved very popular. After such tremendous feedback from fans, players and everyone else involved we will definitely be taking the campaign in to a second season”.