Coca-Cola is tapping into the frenzy surrounding basketball player and Sprite brand ambassador LeBron James and his team's National Basketball Association Finals win through a millennial-centric call to action in which users share videos of their own handshakes inspired by the famous athlete. 

History was made when the team clinched the win, the first time the city has won a major sports championship since 1964, causing widespread discussion on social media. Coca-Cola is joining the conversation and celebrating with a campaign for its Sprite brand in which users are paying homage to Mr. James through commemorative handshakes caught on video and shared with a campaign hashtag. 

"Our Sprite #DapTheKing program is almost entirely social media-driven," said Bobby Oliver, director of Sprite and Citrus Brands at Coca-Cola, North America. "All throughout the season, LeBron James and his teammates have celebrated their success with unique and creative handshakes, which fans have likely seen in broadcast highlight packages and digital videos shared on social media. 

"To help salute James and commemorate the historic win, we wanted to engage fans of Sprite and James, a 13-year brand partner, to create celebratory handshakes of their own and post them to social media with the hashtag #DapTheKing," he said. 

In anticipation of the possible win leading up to Tuesday, Sprite created a digital video to be shared on social media to prompt a user-generated campaign. The video features fans and sports announcers celebrating the win while the team?s colored confetti rains down on the crowd, and then cuts to organic user-generated content that showcases various consumers performing intricate handshakes. 

The celebratory video features another viral sensation, Brandon Armstrong, known as BdotAdot5 for his popular basketball videos on social media. 

Mr. James is known for his unique handshakes before games, and is also partially credited for the popularization of the Internet-sensationalized dance move named ?The Dab.? Sprite?s campaign is hoping to hone in on the Internet trend created by its spokesman and prompt users to share their own branded versions of fun handshake performances, while tagging the brand?s official social media accounts and including the hashtag #DaptheKing. 

Sprite has employed Mr. James as its brand spokesman since his first professional game in 2003, which makes the celebration campaign a fitting tactic and also allows the brand to benefit from the widespread conversation regarding the win. 

Toyota similarly brought interactive hashtag marketing front and center at the South by Southwest festival by enabling attendees to use their smartphones to create Twitter-generated art at a live installation featuring the 2015 Corolla (see more). 

Microsoft and Best Buy partnered for a campaign to spread promotion of the benefits of Microsoft Office through a user-generated campaign that tries to maintain control and prevent rogue content from being distributed (see more).