The Nike InterTwitter Race

The last Nike 10K in Buenos Aires challenged the notion of what it means to have and earn ‘followers’ – and if this is an accurate prediction of influence – by pitting race competitors against each other both in an actual, offline race and on Twitter. A collaboration between Nike, BBDO Argentina and +Castro resulted in the Nike InterTwitter race, in which an application compared and visualized the number of literal ‘followers’ a racer had in the actual 10K (via their race times) to the number of Twitter followers they were able to generate and maintain online.

10K competitors were invited to enter at werunbuenosaires.com/intertwitter, and to challenge their followers and those who they followed. Virtual challenges were executed using customized videos integrated into Google Earth, allowing for trash talk between racers and those egging them on. Upon finishing the race, the runners’ times were posted online, visualizing how race competitors stacked up against each other in terms of two ‘metrics’ – how many other competitors literally followed, or trailed them in the face, and how many followed them on Twitter.

The InterTwitter race resulted in 70,000 visits and over 1,300 registered users in only 3 weeks. Users sent videos to more that 160,000 followers, while more than 3,000 tweets discussed theinterTwitter race.

The point? To create excitement for the race, increase engagement between competitors and their audience, and – arguably – to demonstrate that number of Twitter followers (or influence) is meaningless as an independent, unqualified metric. Racers with the most followers did not necessarily finish first in the actual 10K.
Nike InterTwitter Race (the first in the world) from Castro Innovation on Vimeo.

We Run Buenos Aires 10K