Video Marketing Lets You Get Taffic, Create a Buzz and Brand Your Business

Viral videos are short clips which get passed around the ‘net like wildfire. They are linked to from thousands of websites. They are forwarded from inbox to inbox, either for laughs, inspiration or just the “wow” factor.

Imagine unleashing a viral video of your own.

When you apply this method to your business, you get a triple return on investment in the form of:

·    Traffic
·    Buzz
·    Branding

It’s almost unbeatable in its effectiveness. The more popular your video, the more likely you are to receive coverage in other news media. Television and radio programs love to gossip about the latest Internet fads. 

Just imagine tuning into your local morning radio show and hearing one of the DJ’s say:

“Before we get to the traffic report, I just want to ask one question: have any of you out there in listener-land seen that chicken video that’s being passed around online right now?  Hilarious!  In case you haven’t seen it, the link is…”

Trust me on this..most of the time you can’t even buy that type of advertising.

Unleashing Your Media Virus:

Now, we need to talk a moment about targeting.

Admittedly, it is a bit harder to factor targeting into the equation here. You need to create something with a broad appeal so that the maximum number of people will pass it around.

However, you don’t want to create something so far removed from your business identity that people get confused, don’t get the message or develop a negative perception of your business.

In other words, this is still marketing and not entertainment. You don’t want to send out a gruesome video of some guy getting eaten alive by an alligator, then flash www.perfect-wedding-gifts.com on the screen.

Then again, if you had a “fake” video of a newlywed couple escaping the jaws of that alligator by using one of your products, that would work because:  it’s funny, has a happy ending, positions your product effectively and isn’t morbid. 

Make sense?

You see, all viral media contains a “hook”.

The hook is that the content is often:

·    Very comical
·    Very bizarre
·    Very scary or ‘gross’
·    Unbelievable
·    Creates a “how did they do that??” effect (especially in the case of viral animations)
·    Inspirational or heartwarming

So how can you put this in a business context?

Let’s look at a recent case study.

Case Study: Burger King and The Subservient Chicken

A year or so ago, Burger King launched an Internet campaign to promote their new “BK Tendercrisp” chicken sandwich.

They set up a site at this address: http://www.subservientchicken.com

It’s still in existence, by the way, so go have a look.

The Subservient Chicken is a man in a chicken suit who stands in an anonymous living room – at the ready to take your order. You can tell him to jump, flap a wing, do a little dance, sing a song, etc..

Here is the really fascinating part: None of this is live. That was the catch. For all intents, it really looks like a live web cam doesn’t it?

Burger King must have had some brilliant programmers working for them. You see, there are only a handful of things the subservient chicken will do for you.

If you type in the correct keywords, the script that’s running the show will pull the appropriate video from the database, and make it look like he is following your command in real time.

Try typing in something unusual, though, like “Knit a sweater”, and the chicken will just scratch his head like he doesn’t understand.

Part of the game was figuring out how to stump him. The other draw involved figuring out how to ‘reverse engineer’ the site and get the chicken to do ‘naughty’ things. Hackers had a field day with this.

This campaign generated a lot of buzz and loads of viral traffic. In fact the site garnered close to 14 million hits at last count. 

Bloggers and chat room participants were the primary ‘vectors’ for viral transmission of the URL.

So did the campaign pay off for Burger King?

Definitely. When this campaign launched in March 2004, there was an immediate and measurable increase in sales of 9% a week – and Burger King was able to shoot up to the number one position leader in chicken sandwich sales – a spot they’d never managed to attain previously.

Take a look at Adweek’s full dissection of the Subservient Chicken phenomenon:

http://www.adweek.com/aw/national/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000828049

Creating Your Viral Media:

One thing I should mention to you is this: you aren’t limited to video.

You can also create viral audio. Most of the same principles apply. Keep the content as clean as you can. Find a ‘hook’. You could write a funny song or even create a ‘fake’ interview.

Here is an example that would work in both audio and video:

Let’s say you’re selling chinchilla fur coats. You could borrow the ‘interview’ concept and roll that into “Interviews with a Chinchilla!” 

Have you ever heard any of the radio spots for Bud Light beer? They’ve got funny talking frogs and weasels. Geico insurance uses a talking Gecko as a mascot. 

Borrow another page there, and create a ‘chinchilla voice’. The voice will be key because you’ll need it whether you do video, audio or animation.  You can get off the hook and avoid the need for a realistic looking chinchilla if you restrict audio or animation.

How would you position your business with something like this?

That’s where the interview scripts come in. You could even do short soundbytes or .wavs that people would enjoy downloading for amusement.

For example, a 15 second clip of a human voice asking, “How are you feeling today?”, and the funny chinchilla voice responding with, “Furry and luxurious!”.
A third voice over would follow up with your URL.

Sound like too much work? No problem. Remember that you can always create something really simple out of public domain content or licensed content.

Maybe a short clip from an old 1940’s or 1950’s educational documentary? 

Many of those are unintentionally funny. They often cover very mundane topics like “How to Use an Extension Ladder”. You’ll see stereotypical, stuffy looking men walk-on and say, in all seriousness, “What you see before you…is an extension ladder.”

Just take a couple seconds of a clip from something like that. Get your video editing software (or hire a professional) and insert a voice over or a new presentation screen that says something like:

“Still stuck in the days of ‘duck and cover’?  Step-up the ladder to something more modern at www.yourwebsite.com”

This is relatively easy/inexpensive to do, and you’ll have a great “starter viral”.

Unless you’ve got equipment and editing skills, you’ll probably want to hire out this type of media creation work. Check in with the old standbys for outsourcing like http://www.elance.com or http://www.rentacoder.com.

And once you’ve created your viral video, use the distribution services provided by http://trafficgeyser.techoss.com – they are hot.

Don’t Delay Enter Your Information Now to Gain Access to Your Viral Traffic Builder

And don’t forget to click the link in your email to gain access to a my free paid membership resource available for nothing more then your sign in information and start learning the smart way to sharpen your business skills.

And I welcome your feedback so let me know how it works for you. Try It You Will Like it!!! Go get your viral tool now!

Thanks Greg

And with The Simple Click Of Your Mouse, Magically Activate A Raging River’ of Video Traffic, So Powerful… And So Lucrative…

Generating Hordes Of Traffic Will Seems Like Child’s-Play!" And click http://trafficgeyser.techoss.com for $1.

Tagged as: internet fads, morning radio show, video marketing