Nike Turns to Facebook for Action Sports Push

Sports and fashion brand Nike has launched a major push into the action sports space with a new cross-channel campaign titled “The Chosen,” targeting surfers, skateboarders, BMX riders and snowboarders.

A 90-second TV spot for the campaign premiered on Facebook yesterday afternoon accompanied by a global user generated video contest on the social network. Agency 72andSunny was involved strategically and creatively with the formulation of the campaign and TV ad, it said, while Nike itself developed the Facebook activity.

The competition invites entrants to upload a video featuring up to four people as part of a “crew,” which documents their style and skill in one of the four sports. The crews are then encouraged to generate as much buzz as they can around their entry by sharing and promoting it across Facebook, in order to get noticed by Nike. The brand and the professional athletes associated with it will then vote on their favorite submissions, before ultimately deciding a winner for each category and awarding them with the chance to “live like a pro”, which includes cash, travel opportunities, and other related prizes.

Crews that wish to enter must do so by the end of July, and are given their own profile page within the Nike Chosen Facebook environment, which takes the form of an application running on the platform. The winning crews will be formally announced on August 7th, after finalists are announced the previous day at Nike’s US Open of Surfing event at Huntington Beach, California.

Social activity around the campaign doesn’t stop at Facebook, however. Entrants are also prompted to make use of Twitter using the hashtag #NikeChosen to grab further attention. “The more you share, the better. Retweets on Twitter will help you gain a wider audience faster,” reads the “how to hustle” advice relating to the contest. “Link everything. Your crew’s page has a unique URL. Get it in as many places as possible (your page, other’s pages, blogs, Reddit, Digg, Stumbleupon, Tumblr, Twitter),” it adds.

Nike did not respond to requests for comment for this story, but the campaign is live now across pages for its skate, surf, snowboard, and BMX brands, which include Nike SB, Nike 6.0 Surf, Nike Snowboarding, and Nike 6.0 BMX, respectively.