State Farm’s reality-competition series “Gamerhood” will return for its fifth season on July 31, bringing together a lineup of creators headlined by IShowSpeed, per details shared with Marketing Dive. The series, which has notched more than 53 million views across its first four seasons, will air on the brand’s Twitch and YouTube channels, as well as on select players’ own channels.
“‘Gamerhood’ is really becoming a cultural force in the gaming and creator community space,” said State Farm Head of Marketing Alyson Griffin. “People are speculating online who the gamers are going to be. They want to know what to expect. We're already seeing some of that online.”
Along with brand character Jake from State Farm, season five of the series features streamers who, like Streamer of the Year IShowSpeed, scored big at last year’s Streamer Awards. The list includes: PlaqueBoyMax, Emiru, JasonTheWeen, Marlon and Cinna.
This season of “Gamerhood” features the return of an every-player-for-themselves, free-for-all competition format that was originally introduced in the first season. Players will face off in popular video games and physical challenges as they vie for a prize pool of 100,000 gifted subscriptions. New episodes of “Gamerhood” stream every Friday in August.
To extend the action to consumers, State Farm will launch “Jake’s Neighborhood Swarm,” a new 2D game that gamers can play for a chance to win a custom-designed, State Farm-themed gaming chair and apparel made in collaboration with 100 Thieves. “Gamerhood” episodes will integrate Flowcode technology that uses QR codes to connect viewers to the series’ complete site.
“From a marketing perspective, we're excited about that [Flowcode] technology as a way to have an ongoing relationship [with consumers] when they sign up to win the chair, play the games or get the subs,” Griffin said. “It gives us an opportunity to know who they are and continue the relationship with them outside of gameplay.”
Creator and sports strategies
By tapping IShowSpeed, State Farm has enlisted arguably the hottest name in streaming. The company connected with the creator in January, filmed the season in March and will begin airing it weeks after he finished up a deal with FIFA, Fox Sports and YouTube that saw him stream World Cup games on his channel. Last year, State Farm’s “Gamerhood” cast was headlined by top streamer Kai Cenat — another example of how creators are of growing importance to marketers.
“Creators are a media channel — you can't deny it anymore,” Griffin said, echoing recent IAB research. “We've been using them in that way for a long time, but it's obvious pretty quickly if you're just creating an ad versus helping the creator understand what your goals are, and then trusting them to create something that their fans will like, that they're invested in and that you're not controlling every single second of.
“We've learned more and more over the years that you have to pick right — I would not give control of my brand to every creator — but when we vet and talk about synergies and the right ‘good neighbor’ connections, if the person is the right [fit] for our brand, [we] give them the control and let them go,” Griffin added.
As State Farm continues its yearslong efforts around gaming, it is also focusing on the summer’s major sporting events. While not an official sponsor of the World Cup, the company created a new tranche of Spanish-language ads that nodded to soccer and rolled out Jake-related social content around the game.
“We even are testing a little bit with Jake from State Farm in his regular account, speaking Spanish,” Griffin said. “We're experimenting and using the World Cup as a way to do it, and for the United States, leaning into the Hispanic market, [consumers] that are really huge soccer fans.”
State Farm also continues to leverage its official partnerships with the NBA and WNBA. During the NBA finals, the company debuted real-time, AI-generated social content that utilized a partnership with the Google AI Lighthouse program to react to live moments on X. The brand also debuted a new character, “Stan,” that anthropomorphizes the stanchion pads on which the State Farm logo has appeared for nearly 20 years. Stan showed up in ads with WNBA star Caitlin Clark and will appear in future commercials throughout the seasons.
“We've been there for a really long time, and people know it's there, but it's been there for so long that it can be passive,” Griffin said of the stanchion pad sponsorship. “It was about snapping back attention to a very long-standing logo that we've had, that people know, and re-reminding them.”
