ReelSEO Video Marketing: Viral Video Marketing Disasters: How NBC’s Celebrity Apprentice Failed
Steve Gerard
· 8 months ago
I usually flick back and forth to that show when it airs, but paid particular attention to this viral video episode.
There's a lot to say about the strange mistakes these celebs made, but the most glaring head shaker is when you consider their demographic for the video is young mothers, and yet when they heard the ALL Detergent catch phrase “small and mighty", they thought about midgets instead of children!
The only commonality between that demographic and midgets MIGHT be a take off on 'The Wizard of Oz' (LOL), but otherwise something to do with 'small and mighty' children would have been infinitely better.
I had a great commercial idea formulated in my head within 10 minutes, and was practically pounding my head into the coffee table with frustration throughout most of that episode. :)
But I agree that it was great to see something about viral video on mainstream TV!
- Steve
Peter
· 8 months ago
The funny thing is, they spent oodles of money to get themselves on Celebrity Apprentice and still couldn't make the video go viral. This is exactly what I tell companies like All in the first place. Don't waste your money on production and distribution. Only work through CPM when dealing with online video producers. There are many producers who have established audiences in the 100K-millions range. A couple videos made by them would have done far better and would have been much cheaper. That is also why I tell people to use Zadby because they take the risk out of online video through a pay-per-performance model.
Steve Gerard
· 8 months ago
@Peter
You make a good point for companies wanting to pay for a viral video about their product. Although in ALL's case here, the celebs' videos were secondary to the exposure on that episode itself imo.
- Steve
Peter Contardo
· 8 months ago
Nice post and analysis. I’m actually glad they failed (and knew they would) because it helps kill the “just make it go viral” fantasy that many marketers still believe in when it comes to online video. Even those videos that do reach viral status need to be aligned with some overall business objectives if they are to be judged successful.
Building buzz and views on somebody else’s site (ala YouTube) is worthless unless it helps connect a business with its audience in a meaningful way that serves their ultimate goal when it comes to their desired customer experience. This is usually best achieved on their own site, using their own Internet TV platform, where they control all aspects of their brand and don’t have to share potential revenue with others.
powerstaffing22
· 1 week ago
Use humor only when its appropriate. Its actually a lot more effective to express an opinion than try to be funny sometimes and Team Athena’s demeaning of the ‘little people,” (midgets), and foul language
Andy G
· 8 months ago
I think there is too much focus on HOW and not enough focus on just getting involved with online video marketing. I think a true viral video cannot be forced or made over night. It’s almost like trying to make a square peg go into a round hole….. it either fits or it doesn’t. To sound less cliché, it’s like breaking the balls in a game of pool…..some may go in the pocket and some may not. The success of a video solely depends on how the viewers perceive it and will they want to share it.
In my opinion viral video is something that happens naturally with some simple guidelines to follow to increase the chances of it becoming viral. If you are engaged in video marketing already, I would recommend you follow the above guidelines in this article to increase the chances of your video going viral.
Viral Videos are a BIG part of modern digital marketing. For a video to go viral, it must be naturally shared in high volume by others. Viral video must have qualities to attract your audience and have something about it that they would want to share with others. Viral videos don’t always have to be funny. They can be informative, entertaining, controversial, revealing or have any characteristic that people want to see and share.
With the potential to gain the attention of millions within your market, consider viral video strategy.
Remember quality and creativity go long way in the online video world!
Also I would recommend that you get sound advice from a pro like Mark Robertson or Grant if you’re trying to “WING IT” yourself for your employer of business.
Andy, not sure why but found your comment in SPAM folder.. I took it out and it should be live now.... Hm....
Joey Petroni
· 8 months ago
I like the Laurndry Fairy video I think it was a little long, but funny and "hey" I went out and bought the product and made a follow up video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5ilIi9CHOc
Steve Gerard
· 8 months ago
Another problem with companies trying to create viral videos - and we saw it in this Celebrity Apprentice episode - is sometimes they don't want to be associated with whatever it is that's made the video viral. Or, in other words, they're not willing to stick their noses out and push the envelope or take a risk...
ie. the video with the 'little people' scrubbing the celeb in the laundromat (don't recall his name). Perez Hilton said he thought that one was kinda funny and had potential to be viral. But the company hated it, probably in large part due to the swearing at the end (the celebs really should have bleeped that, instead of saying they'd leave it up to the company to decide). Another reason may have been the use of 'little people' caused them to be a bit squeamish about how it may be perceived by the public.
So the very elements that may have made it viral were the reasons the company hated it.
Likewise, the Coke company was NOT supportive of the viral Diet Coke / Mentos fountain videos that hit Youtube etc in ~2006 which were created initially by EepyBird... until their huge popularity made it impossible to ignore... --- From Business Week article: "Mentos called to offer support. "They said, we love what you're doing, how can we help?" says Voltz. Mentos began shipping EepyBird thousands of mints for their experiments.
Unlike Mentos, however, Coke was not excited—at least not at first. On June 12 a Coca-Cola spokeswoman told The Wall Street Journal: "We would hope people want to drink [Diet Coke] more than try experiments with it." She added, "The craziness with Mentos…doesn't fit with the brand personality of Diet Coke." ... "Initially, we didn't have anything to do with the Diet Coke/Mentos video, but the next thing you know it's on the talk shows and all over the Internet," says Tim Kopp, vice president of global interactive marketing at Coca-Cola.
It's unclear whether or not Experiment #137 [the most famous of Eepybird's videos] inspired the company's next move.
On July 9, Coke decided to revamp its corporate Web sites—www.coke.com and www.cocacola.com—to add The Coke Show, a series of user-generated video challenges that was created independent of Voltz and Grobe. ------
So it's interesting to see Mentos jumped on board this quirky phenomenon quickly, while Coke ignored it for quite a long time.
Anyways, that's another 2 cents from me about the episode. :)
May 10, 2009 I watched the final episode of the Celebrity Apprentice tonight and was very shocked that Donald Trump picked Joan Rivers over Ann. After all the bad things that Joan said about Ann over the past episodes and then accusing Ann of lying about why the interior designer quit, when Ann spoke the truth. That does it for me, I had been watching all the shows before, but this was the last time for me.The way Joan spoke was disgusting and totally unprofessional.( My husband agrees with me.) Shame on you Donald Trump
Kira N.
· 7 months ago
I totally agree! You, me, and many others are choosing to not watch the show anymore due to Trump's poor decision making. The show would have been such a great finale if the truth was forced upon Joan about how wrong all her accusations were. I wish all her accusations and mean things she has said were tallied up and they ran the video back to show her how wrong she is.
All Comments
There's a lot to say about the strange mistakes these celebs made, but the most glaring head shaker is when you consider their demographic for the video is young mothers, and yet when they heard the ALL Detergent catch phrase “small and mighty", they thought about midgets instead of children!
The only commonality between that demographic and midgets MIGHT be a take off on 'The Wizard of Oz' (LOL), but otherwise something to do with 'small and mighty' children would have been infinitely better.
I had a great commercial idea formulated in my head within 10 minutes, and was practically pounding my head into the coffee table with frustration throughout most of that episode. :)
But I agree that it was great to see something about viral video on mainstream TV!
- Steve
You make a good point for companies wanting to pay for a viral video about their product. Although in ALL's case here, the celebs' videos were secondary to the exposure on that episode itself imo.
- Steve
Building buzz and views on somebody else’s site (ala YouTube) is worthless unless it helps connect a business with its audience in a meaningful way that serves their ultimate goal when it comes to their desired customer experience. This is usually best achieved on their own site, using their own Internet TV platform, where they control all aspects of their brand and don’t have to share potential revenue with others.
In my opinion viral video is something that happens naturally with some simple guidelines to follow to increase the chances of it becoming viral. If you are engaged in video marketing already, I would recommend you follow the above guidelines in this article to increase the chances of your video going viral.
Viral Videos are a BIG part of modern digital marketing. For a video to go viral, it must be naturally shared in high volume by others. Viral video must have qualities to attract your audience and have something about it that they would want to share with others. Viral videos don’t always have to be funny. They can be informative, entertaining, controversial, revealing or have any characteristic that people want to see and share.
With the potential to gain the attention of millions within your market, consider viral video strategy.
Remember quality and creativity go long way in the online video world!
Also I would recommend that you get sound advice from a pro like Mark Robertson or Grant if you’re trying to “WING IT” yourself for your employer of business.
Andy G.
CMO
http://www.searchprosystems.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5ilIi9CHOc
ie. the video with the 'little people' scrubbing the celeb in the laundromat (don't recall his name). Perez Hilton said he thought that one was kinda funny and had potential to be viral. But the company hated it, probably in large part due to the swearing at the end (the celebs really should have bleeped that, instead of saying they'd leave it up to the company to decide). Another reason may have been the use of 'little people' caused them to be a bit squeamish about how it may be perceived by the public.
So the very elements that may have made it viral were the reasons the company hated it.
Likewise, the Coke company was NOT supportive of the viral Diet Coke / Mentos fountain videos that hit Youtube etc in ~2006 which were created initially by EepyBird... until their huge popularity made it impossible to ignore...
---
From Business Week article:
"Mentos called to offer support. "They said, we love what you're doing, how can we help?" says Voltz. Mentos began shipping EepyBird thousands of mints for their experiments.
Unlike Mentos, however, Coke was not excited—at least not at first. On June 12 a Coca-Cola spokeswoman told The Wall Street Journal: "We would hope people want to drink [Diet Coke] more than try experiments with it." She added, "The craziness with Mentos…doesn't fit with the brand personality of Diet Coke."
...
"Initially, we didn't have anything to do with the Diet Coke/Mentos video, but the next thing you know it's on the talk shows and all over the Internet," says Tim Kopp, vice president of global interactive marketing at Coca-Cola.
It's unclear whether or not Experiment #137 [the most famous of Eepybird's videos] inspired the company's next move.
On July 9, Coke decided to revamp its corporate Web sites—www.coke.com and www.cocacola.com—to add The Coke Show, a series of user-generated video challenges that was created independent of Voltz and Grobe.
------
So it's interesting to see Mentos jumped on board this quirky phenomenon quickly, while Coke ignored it for quite a long time.
Anyways, that's another 2 cents from me about the episode. :)
- Steve
References:
EepyBirds most famous Mentos/Diet Coke video:
http://www.eepybird.com/dcm1.html
Business Week article:
http://tinyurl.com/EepyBird
I watched the final episode of the Celebrity Apprentice tonight and was very shocked that
Donald Trump picked Joan Rivers over Ann. After all the bad things that Joan said about
Ann over the past episodes and then accusing Ann of lying about why the interior designer quit, when Ann spoke the truth. That does it for me, I had been watching all the
shows before, but this was the last time for me.The way Joan spoke was disgusting and totally unprofessional.( My husband agrees with me.) Shame on you Donald Trump