The eyes of the sporting world will be on Munich tonight, as hosts Germany take on Scotland in the opening game of EURO 2024. For British publisher News UK, the month-long tournament represents a golden opportunity to drive engagement amongst its readers, secure pivotal first-party user data, activate lead partner Betfair and increase overall ad views.
Built by Genius Sports, the Dream Team Euros Fantasy game and the Dream Team Euros Bracket Challenge will drive repeat engagement and enable competition between fans and friends by gamifying one of this year’s biggest sporting events.
Dream Team Euros Fantasy
Available online and in standalone iOS and Android apps, Dream Team Euros Fantasy offers an overall prize pot of £50,000 in cash, with a first prize of £25,000. The classic fantasy football format applies: users build their own team of 11 superstars with a budget of £50m, earning points for goals, assists, clean sheets and other in-play occurrences.
But this Euros edition of Dream Team FC adds new features to increase the stakes and grow competition between users. Boosters like Max Captain, 12th Man and Goal Bonus are designed to maxmise points hauls, but can only be used once across the tournament. Per each Group Stage matchday, users may make up to three transfers; in the knockouts, transfers increase to five per knockout round, and budgets increase by £3m at the Quarter Finals.
Dream Team Bracket Challenge
The Dream Team Bracket Challenge encourages users to draft their own bracket by predicting a path to the final, with a chance to win an Apple iPhone 15 Pro up for grabs as the top prize. Players forecast the Group Stages and Knockout rounds ahead of the tournament, winning points for correctly placed teams and knockout game outcomes.
For both the Dream Team Euros Fantasy and Bracket Challenge games, users can enter mini-leagues with friends and other players.
Doubling-up on gamification
Both gamification solutions are designed to first and foremost deliver an enjoyable and seamless experience for users. The implementation of single-sign on (SSO) creates a seamless way for fans to return on a regular basis to make team amendments, share their results and engage with the overall platform. The creation of mini-leagues, tournaments and prizes fosters competition between users and friends, increasing stickiness and repeat engagement on the publisher’s owned digital properties.
One of News UK’s key aims was to gather first-party user data, which is offered up as players register to play the game for free. Datapoints such as favourite team, age and location, all of which are volunteered in the registration process, open the door to greater audience segmentation – allowing News UK and its commercial partners to better target users with relevant messaging and advertisements.
In addition, integrating both games with News UK’s extensive ad library is helping the other key objective: greater exposure and increased views of ads. Delivered via widgets in-game and in the match centre, users of both games are served ads that activate a leading News UK sponsor for the Euros, Betfair. Ads are adjusted to show new customer offers and enhanced odds within the game at key moments, increasing exposure, overall ad views and encouraging engagement with sponsor content.
As EURO 2024 progresses, our custom-built gamification suite will ensure tournament-long engagement for News UK, maximising the user experience for players, securing a foundation of first-party data for the rights-holder and heightening exposure for relevant sponsor placements.
Play Euros Fantasy & Bracket Challenge: https://www.dreamteamfc.com/tournament/
