What does Coca-Cola mean to you? It is not just a big brand, Coca-Cola understands how to connect with the heart of buyers. Their marketing campaigns WOW. They spend marketing dollars by giving back to customers and create a strong relationship with their audience with various unconventional marketing efforts.
Imagine a college student wants to get a coke from the vending machine but ending up getting more than she bargained for. In Coke’s most recent campaign, students get flowers, pizza, and even a huge sandwich from the vending machine. The Coke machine dispenses more than Coke product, it dispenses good will and happiness.
The viral nature of the happiness machine encourages consumers to create a true relationship with Coke. By establishing good will with consumers, especially in emerging markets, consumers will choose Coke because they like the brand – not to mention the taste.
What do you think about Guerilla marketing? How would it help your business get more attention? Tell us what was your favorite unconventional guerilla or viral marketing campaign was and share with us on Facebook at Weise Communications, follow us on Twitter @Weise_Ideas.
Thanks to Duysal Ekinci for her help with this blog entry.
Contributed by Lucas Neiderer, Weise Communications Public Relations Intern
Isaiah Mustafa is helping to change the way we see online marketing. “Who is Isaiah Mustafa?” you may ask. He is the charming body-wash pitchman and face behind the more than 130 million viral views since February for Old Spice’s “Smell Like a Man, Man” campaign. He is also part of the reason the product’s sales jumped 55 percent the past three months and 107 percent this past month according to Nielson Co. data.
If you haven’t seen the commercials yet, take a look at two of my favorites.
Here are three takeaways from the Old Spice campaign.
1.Ingenuity. Old Spice did not simply shoot commercials in hopes of optimizing ROI and then move on to the next bigger and better campaign (which will have a hard time living up to this one). Instead, they did what most marketers and companies forget to do, build a relationship with their audiences. After the viral success of the commercials Old Spice and Mustafa delivered more than 185 live video responses to consumers’ social media queries. The videos continued to generate product and company conversations and built a community of followers, increasing the power of the Old Spice brand. Take a look at two of the video responses created by Mustafa and Old Spice.
2.ViralSpice. ViralSpice is an online marketing tool launched by Ajinty. Designed for celebrities, artists, politicians and big and small brands, it allows personalized ad campaigns to connect with followers while providing distribution and measurement of interactions. The tool allows users to personally target their most influential followers and measure the impact on their brand. ViralSpice’s ability to measure brand engagement, recall and track conversations in real time will help shape the industry of tracking and measuring online marketing. Viral Spice was named after the Old Spice campaign because of the way Old Spice connected with its followers through video responses to followers’ questions and comments on social media.
3.Understanding your audience. Old Spice took the core nature of being “manly” and turned it into short satires, leaving men proud to be men and women wanting their men to be manly…and smell good. Interestingly, Old Spice did not target solely men who are the premier consumers of the brand. Instead Old Spice understood the influence females have on their male counterparts and tailored the videos to market to women as well, knowing they would purchase it for their man or persuade their men to purchase the body wash. Old Spice capitalized on their opportunity to not only produce comical videos, but also build a community with their followers, fans and direct and secondary target audiences.
Old Spice used creative communication to gain market share, increase ROI and build an online community. Aside from producing creative videos, Old Spice was willing to take the time to respond to followers and produce interactive means of communication through social media, raising the bar for future online marketing.
Contact Weise Communications today to creatively build a community for your business and product. Visit us at www.weiseideas.com or call us today at (303) 996-9940.
I was in a public relations class in 2006 at the University of Colorado at Boulder when I first heard about YouTube. I was listening to a speaker from Metzger Associates talk about how social media had changed the PR landscape, when a student raised his hand and said, “What do you think about YouTube?” Several in the class knew exactly what this student was talking about but most of us, including the speaker and professor, looked back at him puzzled.
Since then, YouTube has become a household name and billion dollar enterprise. Creating a teen sensation, making household names and providing an outlet for anyone to “broadcast themselves,” YouTube has reached 2 billion daily views.
Although YouTube can be a perpetual time-suck, it does function as a video source, a search engine and an outlet for anyone to become a storyteller. This is the real value of YouTube, it provides a platform to tell the story about your company, your products or yourself. You can post silly videos of your kids to share with grandma, you can capture a breaking story on your cell phone and share a first hand account with the country, or you can tell the 20 something’s out there how to do their hair for their fun night out. With the advents of the Flip camera and affordable video cameras along with editing software truly anyone can become a YouTube star. With such a wide landscape of possibilities the limits of the value of YouTube to you and your company are only limited by what you can imagine.
Here are some of my favorite videos from the past five years of YouTube:
Last night here in Denver, while listening to Steve Hayden’s talk From Big Ideas to Big IdeaLs… (that’s an entirely another blog on another day)…Steve talked about a campaign for Shreddies, the Canadian version of Shreaded Wheat here in the U.S., that used a focus group to learn more about the new Shreadies product, DIAMOND SHREADIES. As you’ll see, people in focus groups are very polite people and will provide the desired response even if obviously wrong. This “focus group” video was then posted on YouTube and was viewed by almost a million people, that’s a lot in Canada, and sales ‘went way up beyond expectations’ after this and the new “Diamond Shreadies” campaign broke. I agree with Steve. It is silly to use focus groups to gain insight into the effectiveness of an ad or when your questions in the focus group lead the people to the answers you want to hear.
See for yourself.
Focus Group Video
Shreddies Commercial
Also, 81 Facebook pages and over 280 discussion groups have been started on this topic of Diamond vs. Square.
Steve Hayden is one of the most revered advertising copy writers since the mid 1970′s. He’s most respected for his “1984″ commercial for the introduction of Apple’s Macintosh computers… an ad that only ran once during the 1984 Super Bowl, and most recently the “Real Beauty” campaign for Dove.
This statistic is according to a recent research study conducted by Manhattan Research. It means that approximately 80 million consumers are reaching out to their social networks. Furthermore, these consumers are frequently internalizing, sharing and contributing health-related information via “health blogs, message boards, chat rooms, health social networks and health communities, and patient testimonials.”
Patient desire to consult their online network for medical advice creates an opportunity for healthcare communicators to join in on the conversation, and to encourage the spread of credible information. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has been using many well-known social media applications, including YouTube, to educate the nation about H1N1 (swine flu). As of today, the CDC has posted 19 videos discussing all things related to the H1N1 virus; with some videos reaching much more than 1 million views. But the CDC doesn’t stop there. They are offering advice and consultation on multiple medical conditions, including cancer, HIV/AIDS/STDs and disaster response and preparedness.
Overall, I think the CDC has done an adequate job using YouTube to educate the general public. However, I do have one criticism. The CDC has disabled the comment feature on the videos. *I was looking forward to reading what other users thought about their videos to get a better idea of the general public’s perception of the CDC’s videos.
The main takeaway today is this, whether medical professionals like it or not, consumers are increasingly turning to the Internet and social media to search and often self-diagnose their conditions. Providing easily accessible, relevant information to your audience will not only enable them to find accurate information; it will also improve the likellihood that your healthcare organization will be top of mind when they decide to seek professional care.
Do you know of other providers in the healthcare industry that are using social media as a means to educate their community? Please share them with us by posting a comment below.
Can transforming a flight of stairs into an oversized piano keyboard decrease obesity rates in the U.S.? Probably not, but I’m sure they would add a few more smiles to the faces of commuters!
I was looking for a hip viral and found a Web site that ranks viral videos by popularity. The site, aptly named Viral Video Chart, has ranked one from Volkswagon No. 1 in the last 24 hours. The English version of the video is titled “Piano Stairs – The Fun Theory.” The creators of the staircase were successful in enticing people to take the stairs versus the escalator, increasing use of the stairs by 66 percent. Pretty good results in my book.
Great viral. I would like to see some executions like this in America centered around healthy lifestyle choices. Any ideas?
I was perusing B2B Marketing Online’s Web site today when I stumbled upon a gem of a video discussing online video’s role in boosting SEO for business-to-business marketers.
The presentation focuses on video’s ability to improve SEO via universal search. Universal search essentially takes search terms (ex. Recording artist Michael Franti) and delivers an extensive list of results representing many types of media (Online articles, videos, PDFs, photos etc.)
Below is an example of the search results I received for Michael Franti. You will notice that my search produced photo, video, Web site and news results.
To learn more about using videos to boost your company’s SEO, click here to be redirected to the video.
Prepare to have your heartstrings pulled. This ad spot for the Starship Foundation by DDB New Zealand and director Steve Ayson pulls out all the stops. Everything from the music to the acting are perfect for making you cry like a worker in an onion plant. Have a quick watch before reading the rest of this article:
The spot is based on this phrase you’ve probably heard or used before, “I would trade places with you if I could.” And boy is it effective as a concept!
It starts off with a very somber feel. The father looks sad and isn’t saying a word, which makes the music even more effective. When the family walks into the hospital, I noticed the young girl taking information from adult patients, which made me think something was up. After the hug-switch and the line, “You can’t trade places, but you can help,” I needed a minute to recover.
The ad concluded with information on how to donate. You can call a number to donate $20, or send a text to a short code to donate $3. How handy!
It’s interesting how short codes keep popping up all over the place. This is an excellent example of one effective use in a TV spot. Right at the end when you are about to weep, instead of whipping out your checkbook or making a phone call with a runny nose, you can simply send a text and donate a few bucks to that super cute child.
Ads in Entertainment Weekly are becoming very futuristic. Next month, some subscribers will open the magazine to find a CBS and Pepsi ad speaking to them via a thin video screen built into the page.
Reportedly very expensive (in the low seven-figure range), CBS and Pepsi have partnered on this cutting edge marketing venture as a way to “engage consumers in new and surprising ways,” explains George Schweitzer, president of CBS marketing group.
The technology works much like the musical greeting cards – the video, about the size of a mobile telephone screen, begins once the reader turns to the appropriate page. The ads will run in copies sent to subscribers in the New York and Los Angeles areas.
I think CBS and Pepsi are on to something, for now. The technology is exciting. The ads will certainly “engage consumers” and create buzz. But how long will it last? The printed page is dying – as much as it pains me to say that. These types of advertising gimmicks are expensive – it took two Fortune 500 powerhouses to pay for the ads. As excited as I am about the technological advances we’re making, I’m afraid this may be another here-today-gone-tomorrow stunt.
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