Hello everyone and welcome to our lunchtime webinar. I've got my lunch ready to go, so I hope you have yours as well and I hope you enjoy this conversation about fandom and creative execution. For those of you that haven't met me or for anyone new, I am Jelena. I'm the Strategy Director at Kids Industries.
What is Fandom?
So to jump straight in, we've been working with fandom for quite a long time and there's three questions that we always get. Number one is what is fandom? This one isn't because people don't know, it's because we all have slightly different definitions and it helps to, to share one and to have a kind of a level understanding.The second one is when exactly do I apply the model? How does it work? How do I use it? And then the third one, of course, the big one is how do we build fandom? I know that that one has probably the most interest and is the most practical one as that's what some of you have shared as what you're interested in learning.We'll answer the first two fully. And I want to say start answering the third one, because how do we build fandom? But It's a big topic, isn't it? And it's also one that is personal to each of you, to every brand. And as such, I'd say it's more than that, I can just do it on my own in 20 minutes.
So if we open with what is fandom, the kind of the official definition is that it's a community or subculture composed of enthusiastic and passionate fans who share a common interest related to it… and care about its future.Now there's a few key elements here. It's shared. Whilst you can have a strong emotional connection with a fandom by yourself, a fandom is really best when shared. You need to more than like it. So there's a degree of enthusiasm and passion and excitement that takes place. It needs to be a group that's united by a common interest and finally we care about the future. It doesn't have to mean ride or die, fan forever, like in fact lots of fandoms are transient, but there's a little bit more to it than I just like this today, like a football club that you're a fan of could have a bad game and you're not going to let them go. Always kids have a better definition than the official one and there's always a little something that they bring to life a little bit more isn't there. “Like when you see someone and you like them and you want to see them and know a lot about them but you can't really cause some of them to live in America.”
KI Fandom Model
So hopefully that puts us in a good place of what we're speaking about and at KI we developed a Fandom Model to supercharge our thinking about it and look att all the lenses and ways in which a fandom can be built, including what it means to you, what's the emotional connection with the fandom, how does it change or influence who you are, who you share a fandom with, and finally how do you interact, how does this fandom come to life and what that means.
Why and when do we use the Fandom Model?
But when do we use the Fandom Model? At what point should the brand be thinking about fandom? And really, the answer here is you can do it at any point. So perhaps all you have is a nugget of an idea, a show pilot, a positioning that you want to take in the market. Perhaps the brand is growing, perhaps it's being challenged, or you just want to connect with your fans at any stage. Really fandom can help across all of them and it's a tool for strategy, but also for creative thinking and execution.
What we wanted to share today is how we might use fandom to fuel creative thinking and what it does is it gives us that extra fuel for the creative. Because while I know most of the ins and outs often can testify to how we at Kids Industries use the process, it’s also good to reflect on how we might see that come to life in the wider world and how the Fandom Model can be used to analyse your competitors or, or allies and friends as well. What I will do as well is focus on one key theme or pillar within each case study. But what I want to make sure we all understand is fandom is very rarely, might even want to say never, about just one thing. It's a series of and in many of you working in either creative or strategy, you will know it's a series of countless decisions which all contribute to a shared goal, but I'll share today perhaps what was the leading principle and what's the pillar of fandom that we leaned on the most.
Community
So with that, let's kick off with community and we'll talk about several of the case studies where community always mattered for fandom. I mean, we've just looked at the definition and it was a part of the definition So I don't think you'd be surprised if we say it's essential to it. And based on the pictures here, you can see that it's nothing new from Beatles to Swifties to the army, to really online communities, it's always been incredibly important and incredibly rewarding to be a part of the fandom community, but it's seen a really huge rise in the past three to five years simply because of the access to online communities that we've all had. I think COVID shifted a lot of that in that we realise that this world can give us a lot and that interactions can be meaningfully possible within this space. And, the opportunities to engage meaningfully have increased.
Warrior Cats Case Study:
So Warrior Cats, for those of you that perhaps aren't familiar and an important disclaimer here, it is not an official definition, but I define it as a little bit in between Game of Thrones and Cats. It's for children 8-12, an accessible way to get quite a lot of drama, fantasy, and, and passion. And that's the kind of fandom that really lends itself well to community. Our challenge was to create a meaningful digital destination.The official one, the one that sets the scene for all the unofficial ones in some ways, but for a fandom that already had its own valuable spaces, be that Deviant Art or, uh, other online communities or YouTube. So the official one needed to offer something more in working with the community and really understanding how to use community to drive fandom. We settled on two principles for what this digital hub needs to do. One, is it either needs to give the fans what they can't find anywhere else or two, well, if they can find it somewhere else, then this hub needs to do it better.
Now, how did that come to life? One of the first points I'd love to make is that in the very creation of this digital hub, we worked really, really closely with the community.And what you're seeing here is a screenshot from the website that completely acknowledges the contribution of the Council of Elders (love the name as well). The Council, and it would only work within this brand because it's only meaningful for this brand, but the but the Council of Elders is a community of fans that participated in the creation and helped make decisions that helped how we develop it, how we think about it, and are really a part of the team. And then it came to life into what really is a digital hub, but is a destination where you can feel the vibe of Warriors.
So what can we find there and what it tells you about this fandom and about building for a community, you can see the kind of cat emojis and what that shows is the little special interactions, celebrations of fan work. IIf it's somewhere where fans want to go to find something they can't elsewhere to enjoy in it, they also need to be able to participate. But it's a kid's website, so if they participate in lots and lots of detail, that creates a layer of complexity. So, what we created and worked with the community to know if it's enough are these reactions and that turns it from just a destination to something which is a community and that has a degree of celebration. Now the layer of fandom that I'd like you to think about here is if you're into Game of Thrones and Cats, you don't want to react with apple emojis and just have kind of the generic smiley. So each and every one of those emojis was created quite professionally to mean something.
Furthermore, we created space for lots of exclusive content to be shared here, but also for the fans to be heard. That's an important part of the community. It's not really this one -way, one -way system. It's not really somewhere where you just read content. You need to have an opportunity to customise things, to engage with it, and for the brand to hear you. So that's kind of a little bit on how Warrior Cats came to life, but I also want to share the case studies of exciting community initiatives I am seeing elsewhere.
Crocs Mad Lab Case Study:
And there are loads, because community isn't an old concept, going back to Lego, allowing people to vote for the Lego set they want to see, to Lego life, now rebranded Lego play, to the fact that Nike allows you to customise. Brands have been in this space for a while, but with technology and with consumer interest changing, we see innovations as well.
So Crocs Mad Lab, I personally am quite excited about and observing quite closely, not only because they have this cool logo, but because of its features. So it's perfectly in line with the Crocs DNA, which is very much about, uh, self-expression and creativity, community and like customising your gibbets, but what they've created here is very intentionally designing for, I don't want to say a micro community because I'm sure the vision is to grow it, but for a more niche community. So you can register, create your gibbets, participate in challenges, vote and collect other people's gibbets, get badges, and I think what's important is the reward. You can get real life prices as well.
What I think that what I'm really curious about is how much this plays into trends. So when you create your avatar, it doesn't get created, it gets minted. It's using AI to create them. So it's really trying to engage its audience with a specific aesthetic but also playing to what a trend we're seeing recently, which is cozy web. So community is a really and rich way to embrace fandom and to create for them.
Skill Development
The second one I'd love to talk about is skill development, and that's a part of the self-definition area of fandom. Now, the interesting part about skill development is that I would say it is both underutilised and slightly misunderstood in the world of fandom. I actually think a lot of people wouldn't necessarily think of it unless they're in sports, in which case it may come more naturally. But skill development. It's not just the practical thing. It's not about me going to school or becoming better in some way. It's a really emotional thing on top of those two. Progress and growth are at the heart of self-definition. They're at the heart of feeling good about yourself and seeing your own skills improve, and having a brand that you love and care about. Being a part of that journey that's invaluable and incredibly important. I mean, speaking for myself,I exclusively bought Nike running merchandise for ages because I was using their app religiously, and I just could not compute messing that up and mixing and matching the brands.
criiio Case Study:
But the case study I'd love to talk to you about here is criiio. For those of you that are not into grassroots or cricket criiio is a grassroots cricket. Fundamentally, it's a celebration of all the brilliant and unique ways millions of people around the world play cricket. Cricket is quite a complex sport. But it isn't with criiio. The principal is, anybody can do it. You don't even need a bat. You just need the willingness to try. And our challenge was to create content that brings the game of cricket closer to children aged 8 to 14, in just over 90 markets.
So we really went under the skin of what the skill development means for kids aged 8 to 14. And it doesn't mean the same thing for all age groups and all demographics. Skill development is actually something that is quite unique in how it comes to life with different groups. So we looked into all of these pillars that were important. But the two I'd love to speak to you about is the tension between ‘inspiring’ and ‘feasibly doable’ and they'll use the background of our creativity in order to do it. So what you're seeing here more towards the left of the screen is the UGC content. That is what tells you this is feasible. I can do this. This is authentic. It's an incredibly important value for kids, ages 8 to 14. It makes you feel like this is something that you absolutely can do. But what authenticity on its own can miss is a little bit of, I'll say inspiration is a little bit of coolness. So we overlaid the visual brand onto the UGC. And had them work really well together in order to make sure criiio content is as robust, and it can be as inspiring to its fans, and really encourages them to pick up whatever tools they have around them and have a go. So the balance between those two was designed to work with social media content with visual content and lots of videos that were shared with kids around the world with the visual brand here. It pushed the boundaries of what people think we wanted to communicate, and it was important for the fundamental developments to communicate. This isn't your dad's cricket or your mom's cricket. It is cricket for the new generation, and combining that with UGC helped us deliver that message.
Skill Development and Social Media:
And really with skill development. We're seeing it so much across social media brands, home and decoration brands with the emergence of Tiktok. That's becoming incredibly prolific. But the reason why I said it's surprisingly underutilised in children's and entertainment space is that we don't necessarily always do as much as we can with it. But content creators are. One thing they have to do slightly because they're creating content. They need to establish a brand, so they end up inevitably offering this kind of skill development value quite frequently. Think Cosmic Kids, Miss Rachel. It's quite obvious how it's done. But other brands can do it. Studio brands can do it, too, and I think it often gets done just as a promotion or make free videos and abandon it when it could be a meaningful value add. So I would like to draw your attention to the top 3 videos on Gabby's Dollhouse are not the trailers, and not the episodes. They are not the songs which frankly are pretty catchy songs. It is their DIY content, and their content as well balances the feasible and inspirational. Pretty well, too.I know some of the attendees actually manage social media and content in general, for some young brands be that preschool or early childhood, and even if you don't do that directly, you'll be familiar with the fact that it can be difficult in this day and age to get that organic engagement when really people are Tiktok or Instagram watching those beauty videos we've just seen from Glossier and minding their own business. And then we're sharing with them something that's for their kids. That's about the cartoon. But tapping more deeply into skill development and offering some real value can be a really great way to work around this.
Emotion and Friends
The final case study. I wanted to lean into what I was going to say, my favourite? But they're all my favourite and has us looking at 2 parts of the phantom wheel emotion and friends.
Pokémon Case Study :
And the challenge we open here is from a brand I think all of us know which is Pokémon. The brief was to create a campaign that shifts the advertising a little bit, and creates fandom for the next generation, driving home the joy of collecting; it's for everyone. Now, the way we explore this is by looking really deeply into what is the spark at the heart of the Trading Card Game. Now an interesting part about collecting, and any of you who collect anything will know, is collecting is rarely random or meaningless. There's a reason, there is a drive, and in this instance we worked with Pokémon on their research projects as well, so we were able to dig deeply into what is that thing, what drives the magic? And really it was that. Opening a pack and getting a shiny card.. It's the dopamine rush. It’s special. It's unique. So we dug deeper into that motion and then ended up creating a video ad and a suite of social media assets that really play up.And you can see kind of. There's all kinds of eyebrow game, and the eyes, and that just conveys the magic of this feeling.What was fantastic to see is that these are random people on Youtube whom we do not know perfectly recognising that that is exactly the emotion we wanted to create. It's the look of people when they get shiny cardboard. Yes, it absolutely is. So. That shows you what I mean by emotion.
The second layer I want to touch. Here is ‘Friends’ You may have seen it in the previous screen, but the people that were cast in this ad were different age groups, and this gives us several important opportunities to connect. One of them is to show Pokémon is for everyone, and it really is. It's for children younger and children older, and it is for grownups. It's that fandom and the shared interest that unites it. It gives you a sense of aspiration if our target audience is 8 to 14. But our full cost is 8. That doesn't give us room to push and kind of create an aspiration element for them.
And it just creates this sense of you can share it with your friends, and you will find new friends as well via this shared interest. So understanding those emotions is really essential in connecting the fandom into bringing a creative execution to life.
Grab a copy of our KI Talks: Leverage Fandom for Creative Execution takeaway here.
