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Incentives are an important part of pro sports and believe it or not, they have now made their way into the ongoing Overwatch league pro tournament. In fact, shoe company, “BAIT” is promising pairs of shoes to anyone that completes certain objectives during postseason play. This is a part of the league’s partnership with the shoe company, which promises up to 22 pairs of shoes.
“Gaming and sneakers cultures have always had a passionate, shared community. You can see it on display through some of the collabs that have dropped recently like the Xbox Jordans and the PlayStation PG2s. So, there is no better time than now for Overwatch League and Bait to partner to create sneaker bonuses,” Eric Phan CMO of BAIT said in a statement about the incentive partnership. “Esports pros are definitely part of the shared gaming and sneaker culture and will appreciate what we are putting together.”
The leagues prize pool already consists of over 5 million dollars and chance to hoist up the championship at the end of the season, but free sneakers as an incentive is a very interesting marketing strategy for both brands. Not only since the incentives will produce more gutsy style play during the playoffs, but also since the shoe incentive will come up so many times during the game.
Now, if a player is lucky enough to complete one of these bonuses, they will be gifted a free pair of shoes from BAIT’s website. Interestingly enough the league and the shoe boutique have laid out quite a few goals to complete, which is bound to make this one of the most interesting championships of the league’s existence.
For example, if a player can achieve a Fleta deadlift, which is a term used for a player that deals over 50% of final blows for a team, they will win a pair of BAIT shoes. Another way to earn the shoes is to have the least amount of deaths in a ten-minute time period. This metric will be based on a cumulative tally and be awarded at the end of the tournament.
And there are countless others, including most assists, negating an ultimate, final blows per minute, eliminations per ten-minute period and a Reinhardt Earthshatter, which is awarded for hitting five opponents. All these and more incentives will be available to players during the tournament and while some might feel content to play it safe, there are going to be others that want to get their hands on some free sneakers.
Whether this fundamentally changes how the game is played remains to be seen and will depend on what each teams strategy is, but the idea of offering incentives for certain tasks seems promising. It’s almost like that little bit of extra fire to help you want to carry your team to victory or a chance to nab some extra glory along the way. In the end, this is only the beginning of how advertisers can work with companies in the future and it should certainly serve as a case study of how to integrate content.