The Buzzy Social Strategy Behind MTV’s Live Events

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by Lindsey Francy Sep 21, 2022 News
The Buzzy Social Strategy Behind MTV’s Live Events

2022 Video Music Awards 2022 Video Music Awards

SEPTEMBER 20, 2022

By Kelby Clark

This year, the MTV Video Music Awards achieved a record number of fan interactions on social platforms. The success was fueled by the brand's evolving social strategy for its portfolio of live events, designed to tap into fan engagement and emerging technologies from pre-show announcements, a weekend all- platform takeover, and buzz around the day of the event

According to Social Content Ratings, the 92nd Academy Awards ceremony and the Super Bowl LVI were the most social broadcasts of the year, with 40.1 million interactions on social media.

The brand leaned into a social approach that was marked by custom fan content and assets, as well as innovative campaign activations involving emerging augmented reality technologies through partnerships with Roblox and TikTok.

It is important to reach fans on their terms. Tyler Hissey is the Senior Vice President of Digital Marketing for Paramount Media Networks and MTV Entertainment Studios. The best way to do that is to go to the platforms that are most relevant to them and their friends with content that leans into celebrity fandoms. We did that very well this year for the MTV Video Music Awards, and it's the same approach for all of our bigger tentpoles.

The announcement of the star- studded list of nominees, followed by the official voting period up until and including show night, is what Hissey describes as the first part of the campaign.

When MTV announced the nominees, the brand social team began creating custom content that would appeal to specific fandoms, including Barbz, as well as BLACKPINK's BLINKs.

Hissey says it's all about leaning into the artist's fans. The main idea we came up with was how we eventize the show's announcements and later the performances and appearances day for those fans. Artists shared the assets from their official accounts, with the best-performing posts happening on the photo sharing site, which took the reach and engagement to the next level.

I’m receiving the Video Vanguard Award at the 2022 #VMAs! You don’t want to miss my performance – Sunday August 28 at 8p on @MTV Aaaahhhhhh😫🙏🏽💕🎀♥️🦄🦄🦄🦄🦄🦄🦄🦄🦄🦄🦄🦄🦄🦄🦄csfxffvmmkbdsavgkmkkevhvjj pic.twitter.com/dPGgXe2gZA

— Nicki Minaj (@NICKIMINAJ) August 8, 2022

The MTVE Studios team used nine of its more than 25 franchise channels, including Wild 'N Out and Ridiculousness, to amplify awareness and buzz. The team posted the full episode of Wild 'N Out in 2020 in order to promote Jack Harlow's nominations for the MTV Video Music Awards.

Social contributions to Total Minutes Consumed grew by 79% over the past year. There was an increase in nominee voting.

Hissey says that their strategy is to leverage the MTV portfolio. During big tentpoles, we know that we have great assets on social media, and we're much stronger when we distribute content from all of our bigger accounts.

Real-time publishing was the focus of the team on show day. MTV and Amber Asaly collaborated to create platform-first content for the show.

The broadcast's biggest moments were shared by the team immediately. This created a groundswell of engagement interactions.

Within hours of being published, BlackPink's in-show performance became the No.1 trending video on the internet. 40 million minutes were spent on the video in its first 48 hours. On Sunday, the brand published 36 videos that resulted in 85 million minutes watched and 186,000 new subscribers.

MTV was able to reach young demos with its partnerships.

Hissey says that they spent a lot of time investing in opportunities that were impossible a decade ago. Through our partnerships, we were able to introduce some users to the VMAs.

The brand has a partnership with TikTok before, but this was the first time it had a branded augmented reality effect. The Moon Person danced to Tisto & Charli XCX's campaign track, "Hot In It", as part of the TikTok activation.

MTV brought the MTV Video Music Awards to the metaverse for the first time. Users could play branded games in a custom world created by MTV and Super League gaming.

The day before the show, Aug. 27, the brand also held a virtual meet-and-greet with Maneskin, one of the 2022 VMAs performers. The result of the partnership: more than 1.2 million incremental fan votes within Roblox, most of which came from a coveted audience between ages 13-18 years old. Hissey says there’s more of these immersive, fan-first experiences set to come for future tentpoles. 

The Super Bowl of social media for MTV is the Video Music Awards. We want to make sure that if it's our Super Bowl, just like a team would be preparing for the game, we are doing everything we can to maximize our performance. All major brand events and programming can be mirrored.