Wii's Wario Land YouTube Video- Welcome to the Future of Online Video

Nintendo Wii, the system which has rocked the video gaming world and created a new definition for the word "interactive," has set an unparalleled precedent with their new YouTube Video. If you have 45 free seconds, please CLICK HERE for a brief preview of the future of YouTube, and interactive online video in general.

The geniuses behind the promotional efforts for the video game "Wario Land: Shake It" have created a YouTube 1st- a video clip that actually manipulates the entire YouTube page that contains it...boxes and type on the page tumble and bounce around as the video plays (while the virtual player "shakes" the video itself). As the chaos ensues, you can actually grab the falling pieces of the page with your mouse cursor and move them about while the video plays. This is rather hard to explain, so perhaps it is best if you Try it Yourself.



This video, which was posted just a couple of weeks ago, on September 19th, already has nearly 3 million hits...and I expect it to get at least 3 million more within the next week or so. It has amazing viral possibility, and brand spiraling potential for the game's Promotional Web site.



The promotional site also includes a great little advergame with a nice cross-promotional plug for Six-Flags. You can check it out by CLICKING HERE. This microsite fits in with the overall campaign in that it too requires the user to "shake" things on the site with their cursor. The minds at Nintendo have yet again figured out how to take a traditional medium and add new, inventive ways to enhance user/player interactivity.

The Wii is already hard enough to get as it is...with people still signing up on long wait lists at even the most frequented and usually highly stocked box stores. My guess is that this game, and the fantastic, innovative web-based promotional and WOM-oriented marketing behind it, will only lead to more interest in the Nintendo Wii. And I don't think that I need to explain how exciting the implications of this nature of embeddable video technology are for online video and interactivity as a whole.

A big thank-you to Rocco Stallvord at Adverblog for bringing all of this to my attention through THIS POST.

Audi Truth in Engineering Mini Site

At the beginning of ’08, Audi came out with a beautiful new mini site to showcase its models. A relatively simple web site, Truth in Engineering maintains the emphasis on the car models themselves through a well placed sub-navigational bar at the bottom of the page, which, when the cursor is dragged across, has the rollover effect of bringing images of the models to the forefront. But this sub-navigational bar is subtle enough that it allows the more entertaining aspect of the page- namely the video content- to take center stage.

The mini site also allows for additional exposure for Audi’s recent Television campaigns- one TV Ad, shown on the site and on TV (including some not-too-cheap Olympics placements) is entitled “Truth in Progress.” This Ad does a great job of representing the brand image that Audi is trying to portray these days: one of luxury, style, and top-of-class excellence. And the commercial is anything but bashful in the way that it comparatively shows ‘the old paradigm of these values’- Mercedes, and ‘the new one’- Audi.



Audi even takes a stab at humor with its “Truth in the Godfather” Ad, which parodies the timeless scene in the Godfather where the record studio guy wakes up with a horse’s head in his bed…which is Corleone’s apparent solution for when his statement “I’ll make him an offer he can’t refuse.” Except in this Ad…it’s not a horse head- it’s another strong brand name that Audi wants to show as dead…or dying, and being trampled overfoot by Audi.


Also notable on the advertainment side of things is another video on the site which is a cross-promotion for the movie Iron Man- where Audi has some obvious product placement interests.

The site itself is sleek, classy, and very well designed- which brings up the point that the site does a spectacular job of maintaining the overall look and feel of the Audi brand. This speaks to the fact that a web site, even a specialized mini site such as this one, is a virtual proxy for the brand itself. As such, this site fits well into Audi’s integrated marketing communications goals.

Orange Internet Balloon Race

Orange Business Services, a subsidiary of France Telecom, has come up with a cool (as well as crazy, and a bit convoluted) campaign called “The World’s First Internet Balloon Race.” While this campaign yet again belongs to a company outside of our sheltered US borders, and so deviates slightly from the original purpose of this blog, the amount that this campaign depends upon the online chatter through the blogosphere (which is global in scope, and thus also concerns the US) makes it easily relevant enough for a posting.

Poke, an ad agency in London specializing in interactive, web-based projects, created this Web site and the campaign itself, which is already storming the blogosphere, as intended, though the actual “race” doesn’t begin until June 22nd.

So, to get to the point, Orange has created a new “animal tariffs” system for pay-as-you-go phones and communications devices. For this new concept, they are using animal symbols to represent the different possible pay-as-you-go packages. So…Poke came up with the idea of this internet balloon race as a viral web-based promotion for Orange. Check out these packages below:



The idea is that you go to the home page of the Balloon Race, choose a balloon animal, name it, write a little message, and then you’re off to the race! So, basically, from what I gather, you just try to generate as much buzz as you can around your personal balloon (which, in turn, virally markets this campaign like crazy). As word about your balloon spreads by getting more and more attention online, you gain “internet miles,” which propel you towards victory. The winner of this race gets a 7 day all-expense paid trip to Ibiza for themselves and “a gang of [their] friends,” with a “luxury private villa with a pool, tennis court, personal chef,” et. Al. But to keep the less-than-Lance Armstrong racers interested, they also give out small daily prizes based on a raffle system for people who meet a certain daily quota of online attention.



Perhaps the only downside to this campaign is the lack of content explaining the actual relationship between the animal balloons and animal symbols for pay-as-you-go; there is very little correlation between the balloon race and Orange at all. I had to do a bit of digging to figure out exactly what the relationship was. I think that this could be easily remedied by making the “join Orange for free” section on the Balloon Race site more visible, right now it is a tiny link on the bottom-left-hand side of the page, which is way too peripheral; in my opinion it should have a much more obvious presence on the Web site. It’s important not to lose sight of the fact that ultimately this campaign should directly promote Orange itself, perhaps even resulting in a sale or two. However, overall, this is a very clever campaign that has already crossed the pond (the Atlantic) and is gaining tons of momentum in terms of online WOM, and the race hasn’t even started yet!

Props to Martina over at Adverblog for Spreading the Word about this neat new campaign.

Welch's Grape Juice People Magazine Ad

So, I’m back in the US again, and I had forgotten just how infatuated everyone here is with movie stars’ lives. Thanks to my girlfriend’s curiosities about who’s dating who, and other equally important issues in the celebrity and celebutant world, I once again (see my old post about a Nikon Camera ad in a People Magazine) stumbled across a great piece of unusual print advertising in a People Magazine.

In the February 2008 edition of the magazine, Welch’s Grape Juice put out a great ad. The front page of the ad itself seems at first glance to be a cologne or perfume ad, but it is far from that. The front of the ad shows a bottle of their grape juice next to what looks like a pull-out perfume insert (we’ve all seen these…the ones with a scented piece of paper inside for the sample), but next to this it says “For a tasty fact, remove and lick.” So…if you then pull off the glued-on foil paper, beneath it there is a claim that states “Welch’s had twice the antioxidant power of orange juice. It helps protect your immune system.”

However, the truly different part of the ad is what is inside of the foil paper that you just removed….concealed within the paper is a little, edible purple square. This little square is actually a solidified, synthetic representation of the real Welch’s Grape Juice that you can put on your tongue and let dissolve.



So, Welch’s (or whichever ad agency represented them on this project) delivered several valuable messages through this ad. The first is their central-route message, which is basically the claim about the antioxidant power, and resulting immunity influence of their grape juice. The second takes a more peripheral route, which is providing the sample itself simply to get attention, and, hopefully, retain it after the reader turns the page, and maybe even after they set the magazine down. For me anyways, it certainly sticks out in my mind, as this is the first instance of a taste-test sample of this nature that I have ever seen.

On the back of the foil envelope with the sample inside, it says “Peel ‘n Taste® Welch’s Grape Juice Flavor Strip.” At the bottom it says that the sample itself was manufactured by “First Flavor, Inc.,” and provides their Web site as: www.peelntaste.com. I’m personally very interested to see what else this company comes up with, and who else utilizes their brilliant idea of throwing edible samples (or “flavor renditions” of the actual product) into magazines and other print vehicles.

Telefonica Cathedral Building Wrap

I apologize for continuing to deviate so far from the original theme of this blog (Advertainment solely in the United States)...but it is tough not to post about that which I see here in Spain...as with many other things, namely fashion and design, marketing innovations also seem to start over here in Europe. Once they are adapted on a relatively widespread basis here…the (often more conservative) marketing and advertising firms and agencies across the pond in the U.S. start to try them out. So, in my defense, many of the campaigns and Advertainment oddities are well worth their while here, and deserving of a post on this blog.

While the concept of the building wrap is anything but new, the approach that Telefonica, a Spanish telecommunications company that has monopolized (in the truest sense of the term) the market here has taken to the traditional building wrap is pretty neat.



The Catedral, (Cathedral…if you don’t already get the pretty obvious cognate) is an enormous, gorgeous Gothic church which was built in 1298. It is a massive structure that draws in hoards of tourists regardless of the season. But perhaps the key to the Catedral is that it is located relatively centrally in the city of Barcelona; with a large open courtyard in front of it through which numerous people walk through daily (not only tourists, but also Spainards, who are the people that Telefonica most needs to reach).

Right now, renovations on the Catedral are being done; renovations which are likely to take at least a year or more. So, as is often done, Telefonica bought ad space on the building wrap that hides the construction. However, what I personally find neat is that the building wrap itself depicts what it is hiding…the parts of the Catedral that it covers.

This is clever on Telefonica’s part for two reasons:

1. For the aforementioned reason, that it is not necessarily an ugly ad…and due to the fact that it shows the Catedral behind it, it makes the construction itself less obnoxious.
2. The ad itself says “Telefónica dóna suport a la restauració de la Catedral,” which, loosely translated, means “Telefonica donates to support the restoration of the Cathedral,” so Telefonica also comes off looking like a Philanthropist here…adding to the social good…and they may have even received tax cuts for their philanthropic efforts for the Catedral restoration.



Marketing can’t solve a company’s management problems, but it is a pretty important piece of the puzzle, and in the case of the Catedral building wrap, Telefonica seems to have done something right.

Motorola Razr2 Sidewalk Art

Apparently my previously bi-weekly postings have devolved into a once monthly affair, and for this I act contrite. Things are somewhat overwhelming across the pond over here in Barcelona right now; travel, work at ACV Global, and school have been keeping me pretty tied-up, and away from US Advertainment. However, it is always in my mind…in fact, through many of my travel exploits, having a camera in hand has been a positive for this blog. In fact, while the campaigns that I have seen here are not of the American variety, I feel as though some of the cool things (namely guerilla marketing tactics) that I have seen first-person here in Barcelona merit a position on this blog.

Recently Motorola had a nice little event down by the Mediterranean in Barceloneta (actually very close to my place) for their Razr2 (the new generation of the Motorola Razr being marketed with hopes of resurrecting the success of the initial model…and doing so much more than the Krazr even did). The best part of the event was a bit of sidewalk art. I have always been a Julian Beever enthusiast, as he is one of the best sidewalk artists that I have ever seen. I am not sure who exactly created this piece for Motorola, but it is of extremely high quality as well, and it was even better before the bicycle wheels, and people’s feet got to it and distorted it a bit.



I have always found sidewalk art to be a great unconventional marketing technique. While the exposure is obviously sub-par, the impact that the ads have is enormous. The other obvious problem is perishability, as the less-than-excellent picture above shows…if people don’t see the ads quickly, they aren’t likely to see them in good quality, if at all. However, I still believe that they are an excellent way to generate awareness, and spur a lot of good word-of-mouth. This is exactly what Motorola will need to break into the already over-saturated cell phone market with their Razr2 here in Spain.

Burton Sabotage(s) Stupidity

Hello again. Sorry it’s been so long since I last posted…I’ve been abroad in Barcelona, Spain, and its been rather hectic…though amazing. Also, I apologize in advance if this post seems less eloquent than usual, it seems that the more Spanish I learn, the less English I retain…oh well, not a bad trade-off I suppose. At any rate, while I am here in Spain, the American advertainment campaigns have not ceased to exist; in fact, they are only getting better. The most notable campaign as of late is attributable to Burton, which designed a nice little web site and viral marketing concept. The concept revolves around the site (and corresponding slogan) “Sabotage Stupidity.”

Rather than paraphrase the entire campaign concept, I have posted a picture of Burton´s “mission statement” for this concept below (click on the picture to enlarge it so that it is actually legible).


As of the day that I write and post this (January 22, ‘08), there are no videos uploaded yet, and there is only one picture. This campaign began in early January, so it has been nearly a month. I will be interested to see whether or not people actually upload a lot of content. I love the idea of user generated content; it often works extremely well, adding credibility to the brand in the eyes of the consumer, as it is not a direct, brand-created advertising message…but this nature of content only works if it is executed well, and if enough interest is built up around the campaign concept. Sabotage Stupidity is certainly not lacking in creativity, so the interest should be there. Perhaps the monetary incentive (a $5,000 grand prize) isn’t high enough to warrant the inherent risk involved…or maybe the campaign just hasn’t been promoted enough in Burton stores or through traditional media. Whatever the cause, I hope that this gets worked out, because I am interested in seeing this campaign succeed.

This entire campaign concept obviously brings up some ethical/legal issues…it will also be interesting to see if there is any backlash from the four resorts that are to be “poached.”



Thanks to Marc van Wageningen over at Direct Daily for writing about this Here.