One of my favorite projects since joining the College of Charleston has been introducing CofC GIPHY stickers as another distribution channel for Athletics media. After 5 months of action, the CofC GIPHY account clipped the 1 million view mark!
In its first full year of operations, our account amassed 4.26 million sticker views!
This project was two-pronged: it allowed us the ability to capitalize on another area to drive fan/student engagement with the CofC brand (especially during games, events, on campus, etc.) and it allotted me the opportunity to further explore in Adobe After Effects. We gradually added to our library of stickers during this time, totaling 14 installments at the 3.1M point shown here:
The block 'C' logo has been one of most popular stickers. The stickers provide prime opportunities for our accounts (and other CofC-affiliated accounts) to enhance story posts since they're, for the most part, impartial to any specific sport.
The stickers also capitalize on the voluminous tourism industry of Charleston, so when tourists seek out Charleston stickers for their posts, the CofC brand welcomes them with open arms to complement their efforts.
Playing off the success of two of our first stickers, the 3D versions of our logo stickers further add to the library of options in a zestful manner. The fast-spinning sticker (left) has taken off as our most popular sticker, totaling 537K views in less than 2 months! The retro sticker (below) has produced a similar yield of 376K views in less than a month! Together, they're a #1 and #2 most-viewed stickers.
These two stickers give additional offerings for our fans with new effects to our logos. The C/The College also combines the popular C and The College animated stickers.
Although not as widely used anymore, our retro 'C' logo remains a fan favorite for the throwback line of products. Naturally, the animated logo finds a home within the GIPHY library. This quickly rose to the top as one of our most popular stickers, totaling over 400K views in just a few months.
Given that some of our wordmarks are in cursive, naturally a write-out animation suitably fit them. Additionally, it was key to have options available to work with any and all backgrounds (colors, dark, light, etc).
The white 'Charleston' script sticker has been one of our most popular (currently #3 most-viewed), demonstrating the impact beyond just sports as it is frequently used by tourists documenting their trip on social media.
The stickers are strategically tagged with 'Charleston' and 'CofC' (among others) for ease of access when searching on the story interface.
For the jerseys, it was key to have their movements on opposite wavelengths -- so if someone used them at the same time, one would always be up and one always down (rather than a spooky-looking parallel movement).
The peel effect allowed for more dynamism in our offering to our fans for what stickers to use.
The 'GAMEDAY' sticker prompts a message via motion from team/Athletics accounts, and provides a template for similar installments in the future with different messaging.
The 'Let's Go Cougars' sticker creates an encouraging call to action option for our fans to use during games, adding some excitement to their social media posts. The 'C of C' sticker plays off our popular retro uniforms worn for the CofC250 game. Both stickers further the "Cougars" and "CofC" messaging as the main element into the GIPHY channel for the first time.
The 'Instagram like' themed stickers offer a more dynamic choice for conveying emotions/reacting to the content on posted. These allow for additional placement of the CofC brand in more natural settings.
_______________
Thank you for viewing! This post may be updated in the future with more stickers if/when they're added. Hope you enjoyed what you saw and are compelled to give them a try next time you post a story!
