[FRC Blog] Five for FIRST

[Drivencrazy]

Teaser would have been much more effective (at least with the people I know) if it had focused on the competitive aspect with legitimate competition footage. This teaser would resonate with people at your local board game store, but not somewhere like my office.

For an organization that says it wants to emulate the sports model to get people excited, they are doing a seemingly great job of not appealing to the mass of sports fans. For what appears to be two years in a row they are going with games that are not sports related at all. #cutmorenets

If I'm gonna share anything, it would be the roboleague video as the emotion in that video would resonate with anyone who has won/lost a sporting event.

[notmattlythgoe]

Originally Posted by Drivencrazy

Teaser would have been much more effective (at least with the people I know) if it had focused on the competitive aspect with legitimate competition footage. This teaser would resonate with people at your local board game store, but not somewhere like my office.

For an organization that says it wants to emulate the sports model to get people excited, they are doing a seemingly great job of not appealing to the mass of sports fans. For what appears to be two years in a row they are going with games that are not sports related at all. #cutmorenets

If I'm gonna share anything, it would be the roboleague video as the emotion in that video would resonate with anyone who has won/lost a sporting event.

Showing competition video from a previous game as a teaser for the upcoming game isn't really a teaser. It's a promotional video.

[EricLeifermann]

Originally Posted by notmattlythgoe

Showing competition video from a previous game as a teaser for the upcoming game isn't really a teaser. It's a promotional video.

True, but this seems more of a promotional video than teaser to me.

The video did absolutely nothing to get me excited about the upcoming year.

I watched it with my wife and she thought it was pointless and even said that if she didn't know about FIRST this video would have done absolutely nothing to get her interested in it (and her interests are where they say they are looking to break into in this blog post).

[Justin Montois]

Originally Posted by notmattlythgoe

Showing competition video from a previous game as a teaser for the upcoming game isn't really a teaser. It's a promotional video.

Are the goals of a teaser and a promotional video different?

[notmattlythgoe]

Originally Posted by Justin Montois

Are the goals of a teaser and a promotional video different?

A promotional video would be more promoting FIRST in general, the teaser is for something specific.

Would you want to see a teaser for a movie that had absolutely nothting to do with the movie but was just promoting the studio that made the movie?

[D_Price]

I am for sure going to show the Roboleague video FIRST (get it) to those colleagues of mine that know nothing of FIRST, I will then explain the teaser and show them the teaser video. That way not only do they get a little FIRST knowledge but also interested and guessing what this years game is.

[D.Allred]

Originally Posted by notmattlythgoe

Showing competition video from a previous game as a teaser for the upcoming game isn't really a teaser. It's a promotional video.

Might be semantics, but I believe FIRST was trying more to tease the general public, not us. The video to me has the opposite effect.

If you want Cinnabon attraction by teasing the "smell*" of FIRST, the passion of competition is the best way to do it in my opinion. Ending that video with the Stronghold picture would have been plenty of teaser for those in FRC.

David

* Any reference to Skunkworks was unintended...

[Bob Steele]

Originally Posted by D.Allred

Might be semantics, but I believe FIRST was trying more to tease the general public, not us. The video to me has the opposite effect.

If you want Cinnabon attraction by teasing the "smell*" of FIRST, the passion of competition is the best way to do it in my opinion. Ending that video with the Stronghold picture would have been plenty of teaser for those in FRC.

David

* Any reference to Skunkworks was unintended...

Perhaps this has a better smell...:0) enjoy!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9PvIsZL4cg

[Drivencrazy]

Originally Posted by notmattlythgoe

Showing competition video from a previous game as a teaser for the upcoming game isn't really a teaser. It's a promotional video.

I'm not saying to show exclusively competition video, I'm sure we can all agree there are more ways than showing a corny animation to create a teaser.

But if I watched this teaser knowing nothing about FIRST, I would think FIRST Stronghold is a robot video game set in the middle ages. Does it get me excited enough to visit the website and learn what FIRST actually is? Absolutely not. The same way Game of War or Clash of Clans commercials didn't get me to visit the app store.

If FIRST wants to get people outside the tent excited about the coming season, they are going to have to show the excitement of the competition. This teaser gets the campers in the tent excited about the game, but utterly fails to engage people outside the tent. They would also do well to pay for mainstream media advertising as opposed to this social media approach they are taking.

[Ty Tremblay]

Originally Posted by Drivencrazy

This teaser gets the campers in the tent excited about the game, but utterly fails to engage people outside the tent. They would also do well to pay for mainstream media advertising as opposed to this social media approach they are taking.

I don't think I could disagree with you more.

There are too many facets to FRC to assume that showing exciting competition video is the only way to get people excited. Frank stated specifically in this blog that the goal of the teaser was to attract "the attention of folks whose ears may not automatically perk up when the phrase ‘robotics competition’ is uttered."

This video is literally not targeted at the people that already enjoy the thrill of competition.

"Mainstream media" is a whole other can of worms...

[notmattlythgoe]

Originally Posted by Ty Tremblay

I don't think I could disagree with you more.

There are too many facets to FRC to assume that showing exciting competition video is the only way to get people excited. Frank stated specifically in this blog that the goal of the teaser was to attract "the attention of folks whose ears may not automatically perk up when the phrase ‘robotics competition’ is uttered."

This video is literally not targeted at the people that already enjoy the thrill of competition.

"Mainstream media" is a whole other can of worms...

I agree Ty. Pretty much every promotional video that FIRST has done has the same stuff in it. This was something different.

Medieval theme stuff is definitely only for nerds, because you know, Game of Thrones was only popular in the nerd crowd. Same with the Lord of the Rings movies or the Hobbit movies. Only nerds went to go see those.

[Drivencrazy]

Originally Posted by notmattlythgoe

I agree Ty. Pretty much every promotional video that FIRST has done has the same stuff in it. This was something different.

Medieval theme stuff is definitely only for nerds, because you know, Game of Thrones was only popular in the nerd crowd. Same with the Lord of the Rings movies or the Hobbit movies. Only nerds went to go see those.

I have no problem with the video itself. I'm just saying I don't think it is an effective tool to do what they want to do. I'm sure there is a group of people that will go for this kind of video (I mentioned a board game store earlier) and it may even get some more kids to join FIRST teams which is great. But as a way to get a lot people "outside the tent" genuinely interested in coming back, I think it fails.

I would never show this to a coworker or somebody with the means to sponsor an FRC team. And I sure as hell would never show them this. That's just not what "most" people are into. But I'd definitely show them parts of something like the Roboleague video. It's got everything about FIRST in it. The problem is it's too long.

I mean, look at Battlebots. It used to be a joke, run on Comedy Central. They made it more like SportsCenter and upped the production quality and it was the number one show on Sunday nights for a couple weeks.

And yeah because GoT, LotR and the Hobbit were all snow white and the seven dwarves production quality

[Jessi Kaestle]

Originally Posted by Drivencrazy

I would never show this to a coworker or somebody with the means to sponsor an FRC team. And I sure as hell would never show them this. That's just not what "most" people are into.

I showed both to a coworker who isn't really familiar with the program but is in the STEM field.

For the StrongHold video she felt it was cheesy and childish and said that she would have no interest in looking into what the program was for herself or her children based on the video.

For the What Is FRC video, she was instantly intrigued and commented "Wow, you got Will.i.am" she then made various other comments about how she liked how the opponents were random and varying. Her end assessment was that she was interested in the program for her daughter.

I know some might argue that she was not "outside the tent" but isn't anyone who isn't in FIRST "outside the tent"

[Citrus Dad]

Originally Posted by Drivencrazy

But I'd definitely show them parts of something like the Roboleague video. It's got everything about FIRST in it. The problem is it's too long.

Roboleague is definiitely worth promoting further. If FIRST could cut it down to a typical movie-length trailer then it could be quite powerful.

[Jacob Bendicksen]

Maybe the whole "outside the tent" thing is referring to the tents in the video itself...hmmmmm.

/s

In all seriousness, I don't think this video does quite as good a job as RoboLeague at promoting what's great about FIRST. To me, that's the teamwork, energy, and hard work that everyone puts into it, and this just isn't evident in the Stronghold video.