Tag Archives: Viral video

Season’s greetings

Posted by: | November 16, 2011 | Creativity, Design, E-mail

Why should businesses send greeting cards? For the same reason they invest time and money into many other marketing strategies – to keep in touch with customers and prospects.

With the holiday season coming up, now is a great time to send a friendly e-card to your contacts. Follow these tips to create an e-card your customers will want to read (and check out this link for more inspiration or to get started on your own project).

Develop your strategy early. Don’t wait until the last minute to determine the type of e-card you want to send.  E-cards build relationships with your customers by showing them that you care enough to remember, so a card that’s thrown together won’t cut it.

Give them thanks. People like to be appreciated. By catering to this need, you encourage them to think about the wonderful service and products you provide. If your marketing strategy includes a promotion or giveaway, let your e-card recipients know that because they’re valued customers, they’re automatically entered for the prize, or tell them how to enter.

Make it count. Your e-card should be memorable, exciting, fun or humorous. Personalize your message for your recipients.  This is your chance to be creative and get your message across.

Know your audience. Depending on who you’re sending e-cards to, you may want to divide your email lists into segments, such as current customers, potential customers, past customers, friends and family of customers, and referrals. If you segment your email blast list, consider changing the graphic design to appeal to each group. If you send to everyone, make sure the email blast is generic enough to relate to all groups.

Stay on budget. E-cards are less expensive than sending a physical card, since you save on printing and postage costs. This means you can construct stunning graphics or videos to include with your message, while staying within a reasonable budget.

You can send e-cards for holidays, to give thanks to customers, for birthdays, or just to let your contacts know you’re thinking of them. Instead of sending another boring email, try shaking up your marketing with an e-card.

SOCIAL MEDIA SAVVY PART 6: Putting the ‘you’ in YouTube

Posted by: | March 21, 2011 | Best Practices, Social Media, Social Networking Sites

NOTE: This is the final part of a six-part series designed to help businesses jump-start their social media campaigns. Check out our earlier posts on getting started, LinkedIn, blogging, Facebook and Twitter.

If a picture is worth 1,000 words, then what’s a video worth? Even more, if you’re a marketer.

Forrester Research has shown that you’re 50 times more likely to get on the first page of Google’s search results if you have video on your page. With more than 2 billion daily video views, YouTube is the leader in the video hosting world, and the site that we’ll focus on here. Other hosting sites include Vimeo and Flickr.

Build buzz and have fun at the same time

Here’s the breakdown on YouTube:

How to use it: You’ll need a script, videographer, talent for the video, and audio and editing capabilities to produce a video successfully. Once you create your video, you can post it to your company’s website and video hosting sites, using keywords in the title and tags to make it more visible in searches. Many companies have also created branded channels, which allow you to customize your page’s background, post additional links and forgo the banner ads on regular pages. And once your page is up and running, you can link to it from your other social media sites for maximum exposure.

The goal: To engage your customers, employees and prospects in ways that can’t be achieved through text and photos. The companies that do this best are sometimes rewarded by having videos go “viral” — meaning they’re viewed by thousands, or even millions, of people.

Potential uses:

  • Drive traffic to your website
  • Generate business and sales leads
    • Demonstrate how to use your company’s new product
    • Share messages from your CEO
    • Post video testimonials from your customers
    • Upload recordings of your presentations or events
    • Provide online tutorials
    • Give a tour of your offices and staff

Time involved: The most time-consuming part is making the video. Between writing a script, shooting the video and editing the finished product, you can expect the hours to add up. As for managing your YouTube account, you’ll want to check in regularly to monitor comments on your videos and keep your content current.

Money involved: Video is a big financial investment. You don’t have to be Rich Uncle Pennybags to make a great video, but be prepared to lay out enough money to have it done professionally, whether you hire a staffer with video skills or outsource the work. If you want to create a branded channel on YouTube, you’ll need to dig into your pocketbook further.

Drawbacks: The expense and the technical skills required are the biggest challenges for many b-to-b companies interested in breaking into video.

Learn more about YouTube, including how businesses are using it in creative ways.

But wait, there’s more…

While this wraps up our social media series, you can expect much more on social media in future posts on this blog. As long as businesses keep asking, we’ll keep sharing what we know. After all, it looks like social media’s here to stay — you may as well get the most out of it.

Webisode watch

Posted by: | August 18, 2010 | Advertising Strategy, Branding, Marketing Trends

The line between entertainment and advertising has become increasingly blurry over the years. First came product placements – now shamelessly crammed into Hollywood blockbusters and even music videos. Then the viral video craze, masterminded by corporate marketers and agencies that sought to make something authentic, humorous and entertaining enough that viewers would share it.

Now comes the latest development in the war against DVR junkies like me, who fast forward through millions of dollars worth of TV spots without a second thought: The Web series phenomenon. It’s been gaining speed over the last couple years, and some have been wildly successful (Ikea, American Family Insurance and Kraft) while others never stood a chance (Maybelline, Palm Pre and Kodak).

A recent Ad Age article analyzes these campaigns and begs the question: Are these efforts actually generating sales or are they just offering Web content that is merely entertaining enough that viewers will overlook blatant commercialization? I marveled at the idea for “In the Motherhood” as much as the next marketer, but Ad Age poses a valid question. Do you think the Web series idea is a fad or an effective advertising channel that’s here to stay?

The commercial your commercial could smell like: But do you want it to?

Posted by: | July 28, 2010 | Advertising Strategy, Branding, Marketing Trends

By now, you’ve probably seen, or at least heard about, the viral explosion that is the “Old Spice Guy.” If you’ve been held hostage in a remote cave somewhere for the last few months, allow me to enlighten you:

By all accounts, consumers are thoroughly entertained and advertising and media industry professionals have lauded the campaign. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to be selling the product it was created for.

While the TV commercials and viral videos have enraptured – the YouTube campaign has garnered more than 12 million hits so far – sales of Old Spice Red Zone After Hours Body Wash are actually down a whopping 7 percent, according to the SymphonyIRI Group.

Isaiah Mustafa, the star of the videos, is cashing in on a recently signed NBC talent deal, but the bigwigs at Procter & Gamble may be scratching their heads trying to figure out how one of the most successful corporate viral campaigns of the year, at least in terms of popularity and praise, has failed so badly at moving product.

As a Yahoo! article on the topic points out, this isn’t the first time a media darling like the Old Spice Guy has been unable to translate to real revenue. Anyone who has read the renowned Hey, Whipple, Squeeze This: A Guide to Creating Great Ads knows that the ads industry pundits rip apart and that have consumers reaching for the remote are sometimes the most successful in terms of generating sales.

So how the heck can advertisers win when the “good” ads aren’t working and the products in the “bad” ads are flying off the shelf?

Well, Luke Sullivan, the author of the aforementioned Whipple (which I highly recommend, by the way) hypothesizes that commercials like the book’s namesake comes from – which coincidentally was also a P&G campaign – are successful because they annoy the crap out of us. Think about it: What’s worse than getting that grating yet impossibly catchy commercial jingle from your local car salesman/carpet cleaner/furniture store stuck in your head? While eye-roll inducing, I’ll bet the offender’s is the first name that pops into your head when you need a car, sofa or steam cleaning.

Sullivan quickly counters however, that just because these ads sell, doesn’t mean copywriters and designers should aim to create cheesy, repetitive, all-around-awful ads. There is a middle ground between selling and creating fresh, inspired and entertaining campaigns – and being a good advertising professional is all about finding it.

P&G may never pinpoint the exact reason why the Old Spice Guy couldn’t hock body wash, but it’s a powerful lesson for the ad industry: The most popular kid in school doesn’t necessarily graduate at the top of his class.

Nine funny b-to-b viral videos

Posted by: | July 7, 2010 | Branding, Marketing Trends, Social Media

Who says business marketers don’t have a sense of humor? This hilarious video from Woot about their acquisition got me thinking about how b-to-b companies can inject a little humor into their marketing activities. Here are some of the funniest, most successful and most-talked-about b-to-b videos, in no particular order:

  1. IBM’s “The Art of the Sale” series. Think a primarily b-to-b software behemoth can’t be self-deprecating? Think again. IBM produced these videos to promote its mainframe. The first video has nearly 300,000 views on YouTube and according to IBM Systems Magazine, the mainframe’s blog traffic increased tenfold and traffic to the IBM mainframe Web page doubled since the videos went live.
  2. Cisco’s “Businessman has meltdown in hotel lobby.” This convincingly real-looking video – meant to look like footage from a security camera in a hotel lobby – is equal parts hilarious and effective at convincing businesspeople of the need for Cisco’s Unified Mobile Communicator, so as to avoid epic freak-outs such as this. The video, used in conjunction with Cisco’s microsite, www.donthaveameltdown.com, has nearly 500,000 views on YouTube.
  3. EPURON’s “Power of Wind.” This video by EPURON, a company that develops and finances renewable energy products, is perhaps one of the cleverest – and most surprisingly heartwarming – of the bunch. The spot won a Golden Lion at Cannes in 2007.
  4. Hewlett Packard’s “HP Flex Care Pack” series. This video won BtoB magazine’s award for best social media marketing plan. Funny, yet slightly creepy …
  5. Microsoft’s “The Break Up.” This video compares the disconnected relationship between advertisers and consumers to an obnoxious, self-indulgent boyfriend (the advertiser) who is clueless about his girlfriend’s (the consumer) need for genuine connection. The video is intended to promote Microsoft Digital Advertising Solutions.
  6. Cisco’s “I am the World’s Most Interesting Intern.” Cisco makes the list again, this time with a video created by one of its interns and posted to the company’s blog. While it hasn’t had much time to make a splash, as Business.com points out, this could do wonders for Cisco’s recruitment efforts. Besides that, it’s fun and edgy and gives a human face and warm personality to what some might see as an impersonal, corporate giant.
  7. VeriSign’s “Cart Whisperer.” VeriSign, a provider of Internet infrastructure services, took a humorous approach to touting its ability to help e-retailers with virtual shopping cart abandonment. Along with the microsite, nomoreabandonedcarts.com, the campaign was a reported success, and the video has more than 1 million views on YouTube. It’s also one of the shorter videos on our list – proving that good things can come in small packages.
  8. Qualcomm’s “Butterfly Attack” videos. This April fools’ joke was meant to promote the company’s mirasol® display technology. Companies that are apprehensive about dabbling in humorous videos should take a cue: April Fools’ Day is a good time to try something silly without being taken too seriously.
  9. FedEx’s “123 Succeed” series. This infomercial spoof was funny, but I have to admit, I’m partial to FedEx’s award-winning “Carrier Pigeon” spot. Clearly, FedEx knows how to make funny videos and commercials.

As you can see, these videos run the gamut – from high-budget, star-studded productions to an intern with a Web cam. What’s your favorite? Has your company dabbled in humorous videos? If so, we’d love to hear about it.