Fantasy Sports for a Sports Social Network
Scorrd and Fan Arena create the first fantasy field hockey game ever
Overview
Scorrd is a social network and a transfer marketplace focussing on hockey players, coaches, and clubs at any level worldwide.
Both professional and recreational members share their experiences and interests with the international hockey community.
Scorrd and Fan Arena created the first fantasy hockey game in history for the 2018 World Cup in India. The partnership continued for the EHL and the EuroHockey Championships.
Challenge
Building a new social network is one thing, but just as essential is attracting your target audience. Scorrd’s goal was to increase and keep engaging its user base. In that search, it ended up with fantasy sports.
Solution
The 2018 World Cup in India was the perfect opportunity to engage the current Scorrd fans and acquire new hockey enthusiasts.
The Scorrd Fantasy League was based on the Hockey World Cup, hosted by the International Hockey Federation in India (Bhubaneswar).
Fan Arena set up a salary cap game mode, which is easy to grasp and allows calculating general and weekly rankings. Fans were able to pick their dream team of 11 hockey stars. Everyone had a budget of $100M to spend. The experts at Scorrd assigned a value to each player to trigger fans to think about their team. One could go for the expected high-performers, combined with some lesser-known names. Or you’d have to balance your team with allrounders. The scoring criteria included: type of goal (field goal, pc goal, stroke goal), team result, cards, goals against, and others.
Australian stick manufacturer Gryphon was eager to partner up. Scorrd and Gryphon used their social reach on Instagram and Facebook to promote the Scorrd Fantasy League. Fan Arena advised on promoting the fantasy game and provided data and visuals, such as MVPs of the Match, Team of the Round, and Transfer Tips.
Gryphon ambassadors and hockey internationals Jake Whetton (Australia), Nicolas De Kerpel (Belgium), and Mattias Rey (Argentina) actively encouraged fans to sign up and create a team. Scorrd ambassadors Thomas Briels (Belgium) and David Harte (Ireland) did the same. National hockey federations of participating teams retweeted and shared the fantasy content.
Success
Scorrd fantasy was impactful from the start. An average user spent 35 minutes in the game, comparable to top-tier media websites and much higher than traditional news pages.
Scorrd more than doubled its user base since the first communication efforts for the Scorrd Fantasy League.
After a successful first fantasy hockey game for the World Cup, Scorrd continued offering fantasy games on its platform. The second game was developed for the Euro Hockey League, the biggest European club tournament, comparable to the Champions League in football. Fan Arena introduced voting to let fans vote on the best players after a match. The voting results determined which three players received fantasy bonus points. Read more: Start building your Scorrd EHL Fantasy League team
Scorrd organized a third game for the EuroHockey Championships in Antwerp, for both the men’s and women’s tournaments. Fan Arena added a switch to toggle between your men’s and women’s fantasy teams. We improved the user interface by adding a better mobile menu, a player detail popup with a fantasy points breakdown, and upgraded stats for player research.
Scorrd added hockey brands Osaka, Thurso, Korok, Ritual, and Gryphon as partners. Fans picked their favorite hockey brand when signing up. Based on that preference, fans were automatically added to a sponsored private league to win extra prizes. The field boarding of their fantasy lineup showed the same preferred sponsor. We also highlighted the real-life brand ambassadors (players) in the game. Belgian beer brand Duvel and design furniture manufacturer Ethnicraft were two non-hockey-related sponsors of the Scorrd Fantasy League. Read more: Fan Arena and Scorrd offer an #equallyamazing fantasy game for the EuroHockey Championships
And even the COVID-pandemic didn’t stop us. The EHL final 8 round was canceled, but we created a simulation game for everybody to enjoy at home! STAY@HOME Fantasy Hockey, our new game mode in times of coronavirus
”We are extremely happy with the Scorrd Fantasy League. The quality of the game is fantastic and the fan engagement has been great. The work ethic of the Fan Arena team is exceptional. We’ve been improving aspects of the game every day, based on user feedback and suggestions. All these tweaks and implementations have been integrated so quickly and efficiently.
Oriol PeremiquelCo-founder - Scorrd