Dyson's Viral Video

Racking up 1.8 million views in 17 months, Dyson – the vacuum cleaner manufacturer – demonstrated that even videos about air fans can go viral. By showcasing their new product in a way that average Joe/Jane could easily visualize their technical achievement, consumers became interested – intrigued even – and wanted to know more. And the product in the video hadn’t even been released yet. The relatively low-budget video was posted on YouTube, and print media and other traditional media took notice within four days due to its immediate popularity. Dyson achieved a nice boost in brand awareness that even they probably didn’t expect.

Dyson vacuums already have strong brand recognition, but if you’re anything like me, you may not have known Dyson made fans (actually, “air multipliers” – whatever that means). They also make those jet-engine loud new hand dryers in public bathrooms. Who knew? Back to the air multiplier. It is a bladeless fan, released in the summer of 2010.  It looks like a ring mounted on a post, kind of like a Harry Potter Quidditch goal.

When Dyson announced the product in the fall of 2009, people didn’t understand how the device worked. About a month before launch, Dyson posted a video montage of air multiplier testing and a video with a animation showing “how it works” on its YouTube channel. The videos got relatively few views, so a few weeks before launch Dyson posted a new video. This one was a bit Rube Goldberg-ian in that it shows a balloon being sweep through an intricate series of Dyson air multipliers; an obstacle course of sorts for the balloon to maneuver without human assistance. The balloon moved through the fans solely by the power of air. The result? Not only eye-opening understanding of how the new product, but a desire among consumers to share the cool video with their friends. A great case study in the viral nature of online videos without even one “LOLcat“.

Retirement Community's viral "Lip Dub" video

A “lip dub” video (below), produced by a university student film crew for a retirement community in Michigan recently clocked over a million views on YouTube in just one month. The popular video generated interest from local and national TV and print media, resulting in levels of notoriety the retirement community never anticipated.

Think about it – a million views for the Clark retirement community in Grand Rapids. Those are senior citizen residents singing, dancing, and even synchronized swimming to Michael Buble’s cover of “Feelin’ Good.”

The video is featured on the retirement community’s website and on its YouTube channel. It has been covered by Fox News, Good Morning America, Inside Edition, Today and NPR. Nearly every local Grand Rapids media outlet covered the video and linked to it. As more people watched the video, it was posted on high-traffic websites such as Mashable, Gawker and the Huffington Post. Michael Buble even chimed in with kudos, saying it reminded him of his grandfather.

Media mentions and web referrals from those media sources are powerful benefits of a solid video campaign. And although many of the video’s million plus views came from outside of Michigan the level of local notoriety for the lip dub video has been impressive. Local and national television, radio and internet coverage almost certainly brought the facility to the attention of Grand Rapids residents – and in this case many potential target consumers who may not have otherwise found the video online. Clark Retirement Community wouldn’t have achieved all this with a banner ad – this is for sure.

The internet moves fast and people are pushing it constantly to move even faster, causing attention spans to dwindle, and challenging businesses to get “aggressively creative” to attract new customers online. This is one of the reasons that the use of video for marketing on the web has expanded so quickly over the past several years. According to the comScore May 2011 U.S. Online Video Rankings:

83.3 percent of the U.S. Internet audience – 176 million people – viewed online video in May 2011.

Trust Me, I'm a Testimonial

If ever there was a magic marketing ingredient that creates consumer trust, it’s the testimonial. No matter how artfully you describe your services, it’s not going to be as convincing as a legitimate testimonial from a previous client. But for some reason so many SMB service firms fail to provide them on their websites.

Not only are testimonials for a service provider the equivalent of product reviews for a retail business, but for especially complex and custom services, they’re so much more. Businesses will spend countless hours trying to describe the value they provide to customers – but a testimonial does one better by describing client satisfaction - that’s the real value consumers are seeking.

Results from last year’s Nielsen Company survey on global trust in multi-channel advertising (of over 25,000 Internet consumers from 50 countries) showed that 90% of consumers trust recommendations from people that they know and that 70% give the same value to recommendations from strangers that are posted online. The study results show that this level of trust is the highest assigned to any form of advertising, traditional or online (only corporate websites came close at 70%).

The medical industry is keenly aware of this, as I discovered when I visited a doctor recently. Amidst all the new patient forms that I had to fill out, there was one inviting me be part of a focus group and give my permission to “share my story” with the public (ie: give a testimonial). Medical advertising has featured testimonials, for years, along with that graphical version, known as the before-and-after photograph.

Co-Worker Testimonials

Another innovative marketing use of testimonials has been employee recruitment. Insurance company Mass Mutual set up a website featuring employee videos meant to put a positive personal face on who works in the insurance industry. These testimonials were selected to assist in their goals of diversity and in hiring people unfamiliar with insurance such as those transitioning from another career or recent college graduates.

The initial feedback has been positive, and “the carrier has seen a 300-percent increase in the number of people who have contacted the company regarding career opportunities via the Web site.” (source: Insurance Technology magazine)

Testimonials 2.0

The future of testimonials? Video. Because it features real people that you can see and hear, talking about their experiences, it boosts the perceived trustworthiness of the testimonial. Compared to the written quote, consumers place much more weight in a convincing video testimonial. Trust is the single biggest component of the consumer buying decision – so in case you doubted it, building trust is a good thing.

A young Texas/California real estate agent has gotten attention in the real estate marketing community by capitalizing on the effectiveness of video testimonials. She gives a relatively inexpensive digital video recorder to her new home buying clients to record their home buying process. After the clients buy a home, she has them provide the edited video footage to her to upload on her corporate website – which her clients then promote for her, by the way (by sharing the video with their friends). The videos get published after the clients find their dream home. What better testimonial is there for a real estate agent?

Truth in Advertising

Since testimonials can be so convincing to consumers, there has been FTC oversight to make certain that the use of them is not misleading. In the first major revision to the advertising guides since 1980, the FTC addresses promotion of non typical results, paid endorsements, and holding companies and celebrities libel for false claims. Additionally, be aware that some states have enforced legislation to restrict the use of testimonials specifically for legal firms that go beyond the FTC guide.

The truth is that real and honest testimonials are an invaluable trust generator. Solicit them from customers if you have to, and over time you will have some major marketing assets in your marketing toolbox.

Photo credit: Aidan Jones

Making Friends and Influencing Others

Among what Retail Info Systems News (RIS) considers the the top nine retailers in social media, there is not a single retailer that qualifies as a stand-out on more than one of the top three social media sites (Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube). Even with their deep pockets these companies haven’t attained leadership levels of success on more than one channel – a focused social media marketing approach that smaller businesses can learn from.

In a recent blog from RIS, editor Joe Skorupa researched the top retailers utilizing the big three social media sites. He meant to compile a top ten list of leaders across all channels but he was disappointed to discover that there were not ten retailers who had dominant success across all three social media channels – there was not even one. In the end, Joe was forced to only name nine retailers that had a leading presence in one of the three channels.

His criteria were a million fans on Facebook; 10,000 followers on Twitter; or 100,000 channel views along with 500,000 upload views on YouTube. The companies who achieved at least one of these metrics (in alphabetical order) were Best Buy, Forever 21, Gap, Home Depot, REI, Sears, Target, Wal-Mart, and Whole Foods.

Knowing that none of these big name retailers have been able to dominate all three top social media channels offers a couple lessons in social media marketing: effective marketing and brand building via social media is much more complex than it appears; and dividing resources to conquer multiple channels is a likely path to mediocrity.

Photo credit: Luc Legay

You don’t have do be a 13 year old screaming fan to have heard of the Jonas Brothers by now. Even if you don’t know what they look like you’ve probably heard one or two of their teen pop rock tunes. Anyway, they’re a big deal in some circles…every eye in the teenage kingdom is on these guys…that’s all I’m saying.

Social Media and Sponsorships on JonasBrothers.com

The pop idols’ website dedicates about 85% (of the interactive space) of their home page to links and banners which take you to external social media sites (like Flickr, YouTube, MySpace, Facebook and iLike). Look at the home page – the 3 most prominent sections are really just direct links to Flickr (a photo sharing site), MySpace (a social networking site), and YouTube (a video sharing site) – you’d think that there wasn’t any actual content on JonasBrothers.com itself.

Additionally there are banners in the lower-left corner that take you to Facebook (another social networking site) and iLike (a social music sharing site). 3 other banners link you straight to Amazon (to buy their CD), and to BreakfastBreaks (a breakfast cereal sponsor).

What’s left? Just a link to their fan club website, and a place for fans to leave a “shout out.” There is a menu in the header that takes you to other pages of the site, but it’s definitely not the main attraction.

The Jonas Brothers marketing people apparently believe that socia media is an effective way to spread their brand. And considering that you can’t get away from the Jonas Brothers brand these days, I’m gonna go ahead and say they know what they’re doing.

The main point here is that JonasBrothers.com has made great use of social media, but they didn’t try to create these social networks on their own site. They used existing networks (YouTube, MySpace, Facebook, etc.) and leveraged the success those sites already have with their demographic. You can’t beat ‘em – so join ‘em. Smart kids.