Again a great concept by the Miami creative hotshop Crispin Porter + Bogusky. In just a few years, the CP+ B team have really revitalized the Burger King brand in a rebellious way. An eye-opener for many agencies and brand managers.
Burger King is known as Home of the Whopper. In this concept a Burger King ‘Whopper Free Zone’ was created. Customers are being told: we are very sorry, Burger King discontinued the Whopper. And you must really, really see the reactions of real customers, taped with hidden cameras!
Customers go crazy with reactions like: “this must be a joke, get serious” and “the Whopper not longer on the menu, I’m freaking out here”. Some customers get really very angry and some tell great stories about Burger King.
So if you have strong products, why not letting customers tell others how much they like these products?! Whopper, anything else is a freaking dissappointment. Simple but great idea and strategy.
For anyone unaware of what Scrabulous is, it’s one of the most used and downloaded Facebook applications. Nearly 600,000 users play the game on a daily basis. The game was created by two software developing brothers, Rajat and Jayant Aganwalla, from Calcutta.
Hasbro found out about the game and decided they were being infringed on their copyright and ordered the game to be taken down. This sparked protest from Scrabulous’ loyal fans. The application which had reinvigorated the brand and re-acquainted hundreds of thousands of people with a game which was collecting dust on many an attic, was now being punished by trigger happy lawyers with no grasp of new marketing.
The latest news is that EA, who acquired the rights to bring Hasbro games into an interactive format last August, are going to produce their own online and interactive version of Scrabble.
I’m sure the hundreds of thousand pissed off Scrabulous fans are jumping for joy!
Viral Friday is the weekly viral video chart of ViralBlog, showing the 10 most popular viral videos, commercials or user-generated videos, carefully selected and ranked by popularity, viral impact & spread.
This weeks Viral Friday #1 position goes to Election08 with john.he.is. In responds to the “Yes We Can” video, several musicians and actors made a parody of the song titled “john.he.is”, making a fool of John McCain (the leading candidate for the Republican Party nomination). The runner up spot is for Frank Warren’s PostSecret: A Valentine Video. His blog is an ongoing community art project where people mail in their secrets anonymously on one side of a homemade postcard and shows us an overall picture of send in Valanetine’s cards. SCADshorts’ “Love Hurts” completes this week’s top 3. This Dandy Dwarves creative project shows why they say love hurts.
Do you want to see this week’s list from 1 to 10? Go on then, and have a look! We’d like to hear your opinion about the virals. Have fun!
Finnair, the flag carrier of Finland and fifth oldest airline in the world, has launched an extensive international marketing campaign called “Early Jack” to promote its core brand promise “Finnair – the fast airline between Europe and Asia” to its key target customers – business and premium leisure travellers.
The latest marketing campaign by the Finnish national carrier includes a Flash mini site, interactive banner, viral video distribution and print advertising. Both online and offline advertising directs audience to the campaign web site, which is the core target of the campaign.
Helsinki-based advertising agency SEK & GREY Oy, part of the UK advertising giant WPP group, created along with Otto Films, Front Desk, Flash Fabriek and GoViral the Early Jack campaign.
GroupM, part of WPP Group plc, has announced on Thursday February 7, 2008 that it has acquired LaComunidad, a leading Dutch interactive agency in viral and social media campaigns, also responsible for developing the viral tracking technology ViralTracker.
LaComunidad, established in 2003, manages the development and distribution of interactive communications through community activation, word-ofmouth and viral marketing. The proprietary ViralTracker technology was launched in 2004, and has successfully been used to plan and measure online viral campaigns for over 50 global brands. LaComunidad clients include Univé, Colgate Palmolive, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, Heineken and Wilkinson.
In October 2007 ViralTracker 2.0 was introduced, measuring the reach and response of viral internet commercials world wide, on blogs, social networks and more than 150 major video portals in various countries around the world.
Viral Friday is the weekly viral video chart of ViralBlog, showing the 10 most popular viral videos, commercials or user-generated videos, carefully selected and ranked by popularity, viral impact & spread.
This weeks Viral Friday #1 position goes to Black Eyed Peas’ will.i.am and director Jesse Dylan with the Yes We Can Song. This music video for a new Obama ballad by the Black Eyed Peas’ will.i.am and director Jesse Dylan, Bob Dylan’s son, is a huge viral success. The runner up spot is for Sarah Silverman and Matt Damon with I’m F*cking Matt Damon. To celebrate the 5th anniversary of boyfriend Jimmy Kimmel’s ascension to ABC’s late night throne, Sarah Silverman made this hilarious video confession with The Sexiest Man Alive / ex-lover Matt Damon. Barely Political’s “Super Obama Girl!” completes this week’s top 3. In their latest video, released just in time for Super Tuesday, we see Amber Lee Ettinger aka Obama Girl using her supernatural powers to support and protect Barack.
Do you want to see this week’s list from 1 to 10? Go on then, and have a look! We’d like to hear your opinion about the virals. Have fun!
Do I believe that brands still need a traditional PR and Media agency? Yes Sir! But I am even more convinced that in this digital era, brands also need a Social Media Agency; with brand engagement architects, strategic social media planners, viral, social media optimization specialists and seeders. Why do I feel this is so crucial to brands?
Because we all now understand it’s important that your website is ranked very well in Google. Most brands have embraced SEO + SEA. And the brands that did not yet, will probably be in a musuem near you soon?!
But do brand marketers really understand that it’s also very important to engage their target groups in blogs, forums, communities, social networks, photo and video portals? Do they understand that SMO (social media optimization) and SMA (social media advertising) are the next needed step to take after SEO and SEA?
I looked closer at Jeep last few months. And I am impressed by Jeep’s community marketing and social media skills. Jeep has really coined many social media opportunities in full! Check the Jeep Community or read more at MarketingProfs.
Companies are looking more and more towards the internet to build and enhance their brands. User Generated Content is one of the ways some brands are looking at to try and get their consumers to engage with their brand.
Quiznos wrote out a competition in which they asked consumers to sent in a home made video explaining why their subs are better than those from Subway. What may have seen like a good idea is turning into a bit of a nightmare. Subway has decided to sue Quiznos as they hold them responsible for the content which was created for its contest.
As Subway forced Quiznos to take down the content, the videos have migrated to Youtube – where they probably got a lot more views than they would have had on Quiznos’ site. B.L Ochman has written an excellent piece about this and shows how both these companies have failed to grasp the core concepts of new media.
Microsoft is shaking and breaking up the digital media landscape by announcing its bid for Yahoo! It’s clear that Microsoft with the Yahoo! purchase wants to claim back a part of the SEA cake from Google, since Microsoft’s portals MSN have clearly lost the battle for the big SEA Dollars…
But, if Microsoft will own Yahoo!, Microsoft will control the largest chunk of the global IM users, by having MSN Messenger and Yahoo! Messenger in it’s stable. With Hotmail, MSN Messenger, MSN Spaces, Yahoo! Messenger, Flickr, Del.icio.us and a small piece of Facebook, Microsoft will own many more conversational and social media.
Since Microsoft really wants to beat Google (that is not doing extremely well with Gmail and GoogleTalk), I feel buying Skype would be the next logic and strategic step for Microsoft, because eBay doesn’t seem to know very well, how Skype should empower global e-commerce?
MicroSkype, wouldn’t that be an idea? What do you think Microsoft should do to beat Google? Share us your thoughts..
Microsoft already took a 1.6% stake in Facebook for $240 Million last year. Now Microsoft shakes up the digital media landscape by announcing its $44.6 Billion bid for Yahoo. The software giant announced this morning its intentions to bid $31 a share for struggling Yahoo.
“We’re very excited about today’s announcement,” Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said on the same call. Ballmer called the move for Yahoo the “next major milestone in Microsoft’s company-wide transformation to embrace online services overall and invest in search and advertising”.
Furthermore Ballmer said he also wanted Yahoo management and employees to be excited about the deal. He said he called Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang last night to discuss the proposal, something Microsoft has been thinking about for the last 18 months.
So the rumor that Bill Gates will be heading Microsoft’s Search strategy coming 2 years, might be true?! Would you like to see Microsoft take over Yahoo? Show us your thoughts below!
