MATCH Hospitality
Creating a website that reflected our client’s ambition
Business for good
Working in partnership with MATCH Hospitality – a global leader in the development, sales, management, and production of official commercial hospitality programmes for major sporting events. Helping deliver digital marketing and on-site support for the Formula 1® British Grand Prix 2021 at Silverstone, as life changed across the World and we navigated our way through COVID-19.
Challenge
At the start of 2020, MATCH Hospitality were delighted to be appointed Official Hospitality Partner for Silverstone Circuit, managing their official hospitality portfolio across a range of events including the Formula 1® British Grand Prix 2021.
However, by March 2020, as COVID-19 took a global grip, all 2020 events were cancelled.
As we learnt to live with the virus, Silverstone was able to confirm that the Formula 1® British Grand Prix had been included in the Government’s Event Research Programme (ERP) and, as such, they were able to welcome all ticket holders to a full capacity event in July 2021, under COVID-19 guidance.
Collaborate
With more than 20-years’ experience of working in partnership, MATCH Hospitality’s brief was clear – to take the guest experience at Silverstone, ‘the home of British motorsport’, to the next level, showcasing Silverstone Circuit as the premium destination to watch motorsport.
Working in close collaboration to provide corporate and individual customers with access to a fresh variety of hospitality options, catering for all budgets and race day experiences.
However, working through COVID-19, presented its own challenges and we quickly realised that during this project, we needed to be nimble, responsive, calm, and dependable. Constantly supportive, as the world wrestled with a ‘new normal’ that had created a more apprehensive customer profile and swift, ever-changing political directives with wide-ranging consequences.
Create
The first task was to create a website that reflected client’s ambition.
Mapping the most effective user journey, structuring the site architecture, creating and building a design worthy of this hallowed venue, before integrating it seamlessly with the client’s internal CRM and e-commerce platform. We then redesigned and built their dedicated MATCH Hospitality website and updated the Silverstone Official Accommodation website.
Finally, during the event we were on-site to support MATCH Hospitality, memorialising the 3 days in July, art directing, and managing photographers, whilst adhering to COVID-19 requirements. Delivering an end-to-end project, including initial strategic vision and visual concept for a coffee style Look Book, copywriting, design, print, and production.
Change
The Governments Events Research Programme ran for 4 months in 2021 and was instrumental in fast-tracking the reopening of the live events sector, with over two million people across 31 events contributing to an unprecedented body of research on reducing COVID transmission risk.
And, the British Grand Prix 2021, hosted the largest crowd in the UK in 18 months, with over 400,000 people in attendance across 3 days.
This world-leading study broke new ground on the size and scale of scientific research undertaken at live events and provided an important template for event organisers globally to continue to plan events safely.
Understanding the effect COVID has had on the global psyche and the evolving nature of ‘post-COVID customer’ profile has been key for many of our clients – research suggests that UK tourism hasn’t had the boom reported, and as things gradually return to normal, our campaigns still need to bear in mind that safety over social, is still a priority for many.
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42
%
Sales increase
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20
%
Attendance increase
