HBO brought the Game of Thrones Facebook and Instagram profiles to life at the Season 5 San Francisco red carpet premiere, featuring a live stream and stylized photo studio. HBO re-themed the San Francisco Opera House, creating a rich visual environment complete with interactive screens that streamed visuals of the most popular content on the GoT Facebook page and fan Instagram photos with the GoT Funko dolls. Lucky Instagram influencers and super-fans were also invited to the event as "Westeros VIPS" and got a front row view of talent walking down the carpet and were invited to screen Episode 1 in advance of it's premiere on HBO.
The premiere was accompanied by a global live-stream of the red carpet with several interactive social components for fans. Hosts Veronica Belmont and Mara Raphael conducted a series of red carpet interviews with cast members— including Emilia Clarke, Peter Dinklage, and author George R.R. Martin —during which they asked questions submitted via Facebook comments and Instagram videos.This live-stream also included the premiere of an exclusive Season 5 behind the scenes weapons video. Stylized photos of the cast with their Funkos posted to the @GameofThronesInstagram profile were wildly popular and helped double the growth of the profile leading into the Season 5 premiere; GoT is currently HBO's largest Instagram profile with over 1M followers. Fans rapidly consumed content released in real time on the GoT Facebook Page, including Maisie Williams reciting "Arya's Kill Speech" with fans and an exclusive BTS stunts video.
Social coverage reached nearly 8M people on the GoT Facebook Page and news of the live stream was rapidly picked up by press including ABC News, International Business Times, Washington Times, The Wrap, Paste Magazine,among others. Moreover, this program generated trans-media content that spanned across the social,digital video and broadcast platforms, and helps bring the world of a tremendous show like Game of Thrones closer to fans.
