Toyota celebrates the celebrations with Cricket Australia in a campaign via The Gemba Group

In the wake of Australia’s World Cup triumph and a long, hot summer of cricket, Toyota is toasting a victory of its own with its ongoing sponsorship of Australia’s number one sport.

‘Celebrating Celebrations’ is an innovative real-time marketing campaign created by The Gemba Group, to leverage Toyota’s Cricket Australia partnership and deliver on the long-standing ‘Oh what a feeling!’ positioning.

‘Celebrating Celebrations’ brought Toyota’s own sports fan ambassadors Stephen Curry and Dave Lawson into the front line of a multi-pronged social media campaign, rolled out across Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Vine. The humourous content generated large-scale social engagement and ongoing conversations between fans, players and the Toyota brand.

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In a series of online video and photographic ‘tutorials’, Curry and Lawson joined the Cricket Australia coaching panel to school the Aussie players on ‘how to take their on-field celebrations to the next level’, whether it be after notching up a gutsy ton or claiming a key wicket.

Big-name players featured in the content included David Warner, Shane Watson, Ryan Harris and Aussie skipper Michael Clarke, plus a cameo from retired Aussie speedster Brett Lee.

The innovative content covered everything from celebration basics such as the ‘Fist Pump’ and the ‘Man Hug’, through to more flamboyant moves such as Brett Lee’s infamous ‘Chainsaw’, the Warnie ‘Stump Dance’ and even a Merv Hughes-inspired ‘Ear Lick’.

It was leveraged in real time across social channels as events unfolded live on field, responding rapidly to capitalise on pinnacle moments. Fortunately for Toyota and cricket fans across the country, there was plenty to celebrate throughout a successful season for the Australian team, a season that culminated with Australia being crowned World Champions following its emphatic win in the ICC Cricket World Cup Final.

‘Celebrating Celebrations’ also smashed its internal KPIs, driving over two million video views, while the best-performing Twitter post achieved a 14.5% engagement rate versus an average Toyota engagement rate of 3.19%. Overall campaign sentiment was an overwhelmingly positive 86%.

Says Nic Lloyd, Toyota manager sponsorships, events & promotions: “The results speak for themselves and prove that a well-conceived real-time strategy, efficiently executed, can have a profoundly positive effect on your brand.”

Says Scott Weekley, Cricket Australia digital commercial manager: “Toyota’s Celebrating Celebrations content was easy for us to amplify because it was strongly connected to cricket and was of a high quality. The campaign was well-received by our fans because it was timely, relevant and complemented our internal content.”

Says Andrew Condon, Gemba director and head of marketing: “Our goal was to embed Toyota in legitimate fan conversations throughout the cricket season, which we are really proud to have achieved so emphatically.

“None of it would have been possible without Toyota buying into our vision for a different approach to activation this summer, and for the brilliant executional support we received from the team at One Green Bean and Cricket Australia’s Digital Team.”