Brazilian football legends Ronaldo Nazario and Neymar Jr have kicked off PokerStars’ newest social media campaign dubbed #raiseit. Both football players are members of the online card room’s SportStars team, created with the aim of promoting the game of poker and its introduction to an even wider audience.
As part of the creative campaign, Neymar Jr and Ronaldo Nazario have uploaded funny video duels on their Facebook channels, encouraging fans to challenge peers in a similar fashion and to post their own videos on social media. The only requirement is to use the #raiseit hashtag so that their own challenges become available to a wider public.
According to a press release by PokerStars, the clips Neymar Jr and Ronaldo Nazario posted on their Facebook pages have had over 19 million organic views and have been shared more than 100,000 times.
In the first video to be uploaded, Neymar Jr demonstrated his football skills by shooting a ball into a parked car’s boot. Ronaldo Nazario responded to the challenge by hitting an accelerating car into the back. The two PokerStars ambassadors have a combined of 65 million Facebook fans.
Commenting on the #raiseit campaign, PokerStars Associate Director of Advertising Simon Tilbury said that it gives individuals the chance to challenge friends, a long-time hero of theirs, or even a complete stranger.
The official further noted that what Ronaldo Nazario and Neymar Jr were doing was to play poker but without cards and chips. Mr. Tilbury explained that the campaign aims to show individuals that poker skills can be deployed in other areas of life and that any personal goal requires continued focus, determination, patience, and courage in order to be achieved.
Team PokerStars Pros Liv Boeree, Vanessa Selbsts, Andre Akkari, and Jason Mercier have been among the poker players to join the #raiseit campaign by uploading their own video challenges. PokerStars pointed out that the initiative has seen a great number of Internet responses to the videos posted, reflected by high engagement scores and millions of views. The online poker room expressed confidence that the campaign’s popularity will grow even further.
