Sky Broadband has made significant investments in gaming, focusing on mid-to-hardcore gamers, a demographic sized at ~17 million in the UK.
Their goal: make Sky Broadband the #1 broadband choice for gamers by showcasing reliability and speed credentials.
Sure, they had fast and reliable broadband services, but they faced the challenge of engaging the gaming community who weren’t reachable through traditional media.
With a growing segment of their gamer audience on Fortnite (as identified by their gaming partners Guild Esports), Sky Broadband needed to demonstrate the tangible benefits of their speedy service through a medium that this demographic cared about.
Sky Broadband is not a well known provider among gamers, so how would Sky reach this audience without disrupting their gameplay or alienating them with overt advertising?
We built Sky City. A playable monument to Sky Broadband and lag-free, competitive gaming.
This was a custom Fortnite island in the sky, like the brand name, but also high above the sluggish street-level play to ensure a seamless, high-speed playground.
Sky City featured a carefully designed skyscraper battleground for tactical combat, along with other Sky-themed areas which allowed players to immerse themselves in different themed environments, ranging from golf and tennis to racing and football while allowing for subtle nods to other Sky brands and products.
Gaming Community
To get users to Sky City, Guild Esports launched a first-of-its-kind creator-led tournament Speed Showdown. The campaign kicked-off with Ruby “RubyPlays,” a Guild Esports Pro-Fortnite player, inviting gamers to experience “an awesome mix of smart and competitive gameplay elements”.
Fellow gaming creators Sunpi, Tubbo, Archie, and LittleBunny, with a collective 5.6 million subscribers across their socials, supported the launch with livestream promotions, encouraging their audiences to take part in speed battles - a unique experience bringing streamers and their audiences together. Sky made it extra-competitive with real-world prizes.
In addition, we partnered with the #1 Fortnite creator, TheBoyDilly, placing a portal from his #1 UGC custom map, Go Goated Zone Wars, to Sky City, for 72 hours.
DESIGN & DELIVERY
The Sky City concept began at street-level, but after realizing this would slow momentum, we shifted to the skies. This literally and figuratively elevated gameplay above city streets to rooftops for a seamless, high-speed playground.
We wanted to present Sky Broadband as the ultimate speed provider for competitive gamers. To bring that goal to life, we researched how to visualize speed. We chose devices to boost speed as players race into Sky City, grinding on speed rails, searching for weapons, blasting through tunnels and launching through portals. Launch pads, zip lines, and rail paths offer strategic advantage, while the intense energy pulsing from the Sky Broadband Tower grants players boosts.
We designed three iconic skyscrapers blending modern and futuristic aesthetics and surrounded them with warm, brick buildings. At the heart of it all was the Sky Tower, the centerpiece powered by Sky Broadband and wrapped in vibrant spectrum colors. This concept took several iterations before it felt alive and integral to the gameplay experience.
Subtle nods to other Sky brands were woven into the skyline. The Sky Cinema building featured dynamic branding on its screen, offering players strategic cover. The Sky Sports skyscraper created battlegrounds in themed areas, from golf and tennis to racing and football. The Penthouse offered easter eggs referencing the Sky WiFi Max Hub and Sky Glass product. This integrated the brand without distracting from the action.
Playtesting confirmed the impact: players loved the high-speed experience and the timed energy boosts emanating from the Sky Tower.
Within 24 hours of Sky City’s launch, the game was chosen for Epic’s Picks, a curated selection of standout islands within Fortnite. Epic highlighted Sky City’s creativity, fun game play, engagement, and unique appeal which contributed to the campaign’s Earned Media.
Brand Uplift
TikTok Ad Recall +3%
Awareness +2.5%
Meta Ad Recall +3.3%
Brand Association with Gaming +2.6%
Sky City became a playable ad with over 200k plays (+2,000% above category benchmark) and an average playtime of 23 minutes.
For 8 days Sky City featured on Epic’s Picks and often at #1 or #2
94M+ Thumbnail Impressions
35K+ Hours Total Time Played Since Launch
23 Minutes Daily Average Playtime
200K+ Plays
3M+ Brand Interactions
1.5M+ Speed Rail Rides which truly delivered on the super-fast broadband promise.
The Speed Showdown battles generated:
140k live event Views
150M paid media Views
25k Engagements
27.1M Combined Reach
And from our collaboration with TheBoyDilly who added a portal to Sky City within his game, a further:
2.8M Unique Players Reached
94M Total Estimated Impressions (+1,467% over target)
Sky City not only made Sky Broadband synonymous with gaming performance but has set up Sky City to live on and feature more of Sky’s IP in future.
