While you are reading this text, millions of people around the world are watching or uploading videos on YouTube.
The most recent statistics reveal that Internet users upload the
equivalent of 48 hours of content to this Google platform every minute.
Furthermore, around 3000 million YouTube videos are viewed every day.
YouTube has become almost as fundamental and essential as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn for
developing an online marketing campaign. Of course, it is a platform
that needs more production effort and a relatively higher marketing
budget. Nevertheless, the truth is that its penetration and impact make
it an inevitable option for brands, since it has yielded excellent
results for small, medium, and large companies.
Important companies like Old Spice and Ford have
already developed successful campaigns designed exclusively for
broadcast on YouTube that can be taken as examples for any brand that
wants to develop an effective online media campaign.
In the case of the male fragrance company, their original video series, The Man Your Man Could Smell Like, has 35 million views so far. In addition, more than 100 comments were generated from Internet users’ interactions, each with an average of approximately 100,000 views.
As to Ford, the American automotive industry giant created an original video series called The Fiesta Movement.
They gave 100 new Fiesta to young people who had “a strong presence on
the web, the ability to tell appealing stories on video, and a craving
for adventure.” In return, the participants carried out “missions” with
their cars, usually journeys or a visits to tourist sites, filmed them,
and uploaded them to their YouTube profiles. The campaign was a complete
success: Ford achieved 4.3 million hits on the social network, sold
10,000 units of the new car during its first six days on sale, and
500,000 during the first year.
Blendtec Case
The most interesting case, without a doubt, is that of Blendtec,
a small American company dedicated to the manufacture of blenders. The
company was relatively well known among gastronomic professionals, but
had not been able to penetrate strongly into the home consumers’ market.
However, the brand became a real hit in the online universe and was
able to position its home equipment line thanks to a YouTube promotion
called Will it blend?
The campaign consisted of a series of original videos starring
the president of the company, Tom Dickson. Dressed as a sort of
scientist working in his lab, he demonstrated his products blending
strange objects such as golf balls, a rake, and an iPhone or iPad 2. The
campaign that began with a budget of $50 achieved a resounding success,
Dickson became an online celebrity, and Blendtec sales showed
an incredible growth of about 500%.
As
users spend more time online and turn to the web for their daily
consumption of media, brands must intensify their creativity and keep
looking for original alternatives to differentiate themselves from their
competitors. In this respect, the audiovisual content networks like
YouTube are showing a high degree of efficiency, especially as tools to
cultivate the loyalty of Internet users, encourage their participation,
and strengthen brand loyalty. This can be translated into excellent
results for brands in terms of visibility and commercial results.
