Future of Marketing, Thy Name Is Baron
Viral + celebrities + humor = The future of marketing.
Two brilliant YouTube videos have been making the rounds the past two weeks that are fantastic examples of how to use viral marketing - one overt, the other more subtle. But both use the above formula sublimely.
The first is a pretty ingenious piece of cross-promotion for iBeatYou.com, a competition-based social network started by NBA star, entrepreneur and LaunchSquad hero Baron Davis. The clip features Baron and Adam Sandler as Zohan, the title character from his new movie, in a staring contest. It’s really funny
(Why is Baron a LaunchSquad hero? Well, that’s pretty obvious.)
The second doesn’t actually mention a brand by name – but is for Nike – stars Kobe Bryant and the “Jackass” guys, well, doing stupid stuff. Also very funny:
So, what’s the common denominator here? 2.8 million. That’s the total number of views these videos have gotten for only the nominal cost of producing these videos. How’s that for effective? Millions of people – engaged users who sought this content out – saw these ads and they cost literally nothing. Just a bit of star power and creativity.
I was at the Under The Radar conference in Mountain View earlier this week and there was an interesting discussion amongst a panel of Internet advertising execs about why companies haven’t abandoned traditional advertising for these types of viral campaigns. The answer was a mix of two factors: First, the there will always be a need, in some manner and in some scale, for traditional advertising; and second, that big companies and agencies are simply addicted to buying advertising. That’s amazing.
Being skeptical of new technology is one thing, but ignoring it because, well, that’s the way you’ve always done it, is just stupid. All it’s going to take is for one of these types of campaigns to totally blow up and all the sudden, they’ll become the norm – I’m sure advertising on television was scary for a while back in the early 1950s. Until then, it’ll be pretty easy to spot the savvy companies. Just visit YouTube.
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