The Academy Digital Team created videos spotlighting 10 behind-the-camera categories to increase awareness of and investment in nominees and their crafts while driving 95th Oscars tune-in.
As a part of the 95th Academy Awards and in support of the Oscars95 campaign, the Academy's digital marketing team created 10 original video compilations named “Nominee Spotlight,” highlighting nominees across different categories. All videos were housed on A.frame, the Academy’s digital magazine, and published on the Academy’s official YouTube channel.
To drive traffic to the video compilations and their supporting articles, QR codes were created and displayed during the 95th Oscars telecast leading into commercial breaks before each individual category’s winner was announced.
Additionally, the YouTube videos were a part of a targeted paid campaign launched a few a days before the 95th Oscars to drive both nominee and craft category awareness while pushing to live in show tune-in.
The production and creative strategy involved several tiers. The first of which was compiling assets for the videos. We curated existing content and shot exclusive interviews in order to highlight over 50 nominees and showcase their films and individual crafts. The categories included:
- Best Original Screenplay
- Best Adapted Screenplay
- Best Costume Design
- Best Production Design
- Best Makeup & Hairstyling
- Best Cinematography
- Best Sound
- Best Original Song
- Best Original Score
- Best Film Editing
After all “Nominee Spotlight” videos were completed, we generated QR codes for each. These codes pointed to individual article landing pages on A.frame, allowing us to track metrics related to the project and incentivize new visitors to sign up for A.frame’s newsletter with a custom pop-up and widget appearing on each article page. Articles included a YouTube video embed, along with custom made graphics, and links to exclusive Oscars content published on A.frame.
We also coordinated with the 95th Oscars show production team in order to incorporate the QR code graphics into the running order of the broadcast, aligning each category with its subsequent winner announcement to give the viewers at home a more engaging experience.
Additionally, we collaborated with the in-house Dolby Theater team to show the “Nominee Spotlight” videos to the attendees of the 95th Oscars during commercial breaks. The byproduct of all of this was a confluence of video production frameworks, editorial guidance, broadcast graphic coordination, live-ops theater support, and an at-home digital viewership experience in harmony with linear television.
We are extremely proud of the creative roadmap that we created to successfully execute this activation, and are reminded of the proverb that "it takes a village to raise a child."
The 10 Craft Category Highlight Videos not only raised awareness and garnered support for the nominees and their crafts but also significantly contributed to the retention of viewers of the Oscars. The QR codes were placed throughout the live telecast, which forced viewers to continue watching in order to scan each code. This success is reflected in the statistics collected four days post-show: 70K+ in-show scans, over 13 million video views, more than 328K hours watched, and 80K+ article pageviews on Oscars night.
