The First Point Volleyball Foundation (formerly MotorMVB)
is a non-profit organization that aims to increase awareness and participation in boys' and men's volleyball nationwide. Our team intends to further this mission through the development of a cross-platform storytelling and social media campaign that highlights the value of the sport.
Team
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Kylie Leonard
Ciara Johnson
Chao Wang
What I Did
UX Research, Design Thinking workshop, User Testing, UX Design, Graphic Design
First Point Volleyball Foundation
The First Point Volleyball Foundation is focused on increasing opportunities for boys and men in volleyball by expanding the number of Division I and Division II collegiate programs and scholarships available. This expansion will create a larger talent pool for the next two Olympic Games in 2020 and 2024. The Foundation's goal by 2026 is to have 40 Division I programs, 50 Division II programs, 200 Division III programs, 60 NAIA programs, and 30 Junior Colleges.
Objectives
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Increase the number of Division I and Division II programs and scholarships.
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Encourage volleyball alumni to donate resources toward the development of the First Point Volleyball Foundation.
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Collect stories from volleyball players nationwide and recruit young boys to play volleyball.
THE PROCESS
UNDERSTAN
the user
DEFINE
the problem
IDEATE
the solution
PROTOTYPE
the experience
VALIDATE
the solution
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Identify the key stakeholders and their relationships.
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Empathy research
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Create personas to represent the user types
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Define the problem
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Problem statement
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Mind mapping
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HMW questions
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Saturate and Group
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Design
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User testing
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Concept testing
User Journey
Problem Space
Currently, there are only 22 Division I feeder programs for competitive men's volleyball in the United States. The limited availability of such programs makes it challenging for the U.S. Men's National Team to compete effectively with other countries.
Additionally, since men's volleyball is not yet a sanctioned sport in high schools, with only 22 states currently offering programs, the number of boys participating in the sport is limited to an estimated 55,000.
IDEATE
How Might We develop a storytelling campaign that incorporates the men’s national team, collegiate men’s volleyball, and national youth programs, while raising awareness about the value of the sport.
Methodology
The project will use both quantitative and qualitative data collection tools and analyze case studies to understand current storytelling methods.
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Data Collection
The data collection process will consist of surveys, observations, and interviews with various stakeholders involved in men's volleyball.
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Similar Case Studies
The similar case studies will focus on the storytelling methods used in various sports, as well as in male relationships and entertainment.
Design Thinking
The project will also hold brainstorming sessions with current collegiate volleyball players to gain insights into their interests, social media behaviors, and connection to the sport.
Key Findings
Humanization of players is important.
Successful sports storytelling campaigns humanize and personalize the players outside the sport.
Our research of 19 similar case studies revealed sports storytelling campaigns often relied on humanizing and personalizing the players as individuals outside of the sport itself.
Relationship marketing is key.
Relationship marketing is key to successful social media campaigns, building and strengthening the audience's connection to the players, the sport, and the content.
Fins are motivated by various factors.
Sports fans are motivated by various factors, including their need for escape, eustress, self-esteem, entertainment, aesthetic, group affiliation, family, and economic factors such as gambling and betting.
Fan typologies impact marketing approach.
Fan typologies play a significant role in how marketers approach social media marketing.
College fans prefer Snapchat and Instagram.
College sports fans are motivated by entertainment and convenience to use social media. They have a stronger affinity towards Snapchat and Instagram.
Youth fans share information on Facebook.
Youth sports fans are motivated by information sharing on Facebook.
Effective targeting uses multiple platforms.
Effective audience targeting requires the use of various social platforms to engage multiple audience segments, including Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, and Twitter.
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Facebook - hub for information
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Snapchat - superior for socialization
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Instagram - creative and visual
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Twitter - timely and direct
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Use clear calls to action and customizable post/data insight options to inform marketers on what’s working
Key Requirements
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Must engage players at all levels
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Must robust and far-reaching marketing campaign
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Must create original published content
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Must connect fans to volleyball community influencers
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Must create engaging content sharing volleyball stories
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Must leverage collegiate reporting opportunities
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Must grow social media following on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram.
Constraints
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Busy schedules of professional players/Olympians
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Costly and/or difficult journalistic reporting involving MNT members overseas
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Limited availability of Journalism 397 students
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Limited funding for attending tournaments and conferences
Design & Prototyping
This Project yielded three significant outcomes:
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Social media strategy
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25 multimedia stories
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Live Event Plan
Social Media Strategy
The social media campaign brought together and showcased stories from the men’s national team, collegiate players, and national youth teams. Three phases of media strategies were employed from November 2017 to May 2018 to engage volleyball fans and connect with teams and organizations in the community. One element of the campaign strategy that connected fans to the MotorMVB brand and mission was the use of Instagram polls (as seen in the images below). Social media was also utilized to drive traffic to the MotorMVB website that housed weekly cover stories.
NCAA & AVCA Ranking
Every Monday, the NCAA and AVCA release the results of the coaches' poll, which ranks all the teams in the United States to determine the top 15. Two versions of the graphics were created, one blue and one red, with the color scheme depending on the weekend's "weekly matches." The background picture came from the winning team, showcasing their players. Due to Long Beach State's success that season, they were the only group showcased.
Weekly Weekend Matchups
​Starting the spring semester, this campaign integrated a series of weekend matches on Fridays and Saturdays. Using the NCAA & AVCA rankings, the top matchup was picked for each conference (Big West, Conference Carolinas, EIVA, MIVA, and MPSF) for both nights. Conference Carolinas did not have a contender in the top 15, so their internal conference rankings were used. The following graphics showcase samples of these weekend graphics.
The first graphic showcases the team’s work with the conference’s championship tournament. We provided bracket graphics each night of the tournament. Brackets were uncommon with Men’s Volleyball, which allowed MotorMVB to provide a service to the volleyball community.
Instagram Story Graphics
​In addition to the weekly weekend matchup graphics, an additional graphic was created for Instagram’s tool “story”. Here the followers were able to vote for who they thought were going to win the match. During the conference championship tournaments, the team updated brackets of who was moving on to the next round the same night. This provided an easy place for followers to receive accurate and fast information about the tournaments.
Text Graphics
The purpose of having text-based graphics was to give followers the opportunity to provide user-generated content about the prompt. These prompts provided the opportunity for a 13-year-old boy to connect with a member of the men's national team.
For more information on the social media campaign and a detailed marketing plan, a full version of the document can be accessed here.