Friday, April 22, 2011

Will Twilight Blend? (or How to Piggyback Your Product Onto Apple's)

I wanted an iPhone from the moment Steve Jobs held one in his golden-god fingertips at Macworld 2007. Wanted one BAD.

So, you can imagine my horror when this schmuck with a blender company posted this video with his brand new iPhone...


He does this all the time! With an iPad, an iPhone 4, etc.

I also have been observing for the past year a trend of Twilight Non-fan Spoofs. That's right - videos pretending to be made by loyal Edward/Jacob-ites who are really just out to make fun of the Saga of Lameness. And I find that to be glorious. But what's more important - it makes for HOT Viral power.



See, these people have two things in common:

1. They took the time make videos that looked professionally-made (a rarity in YouTubia)
2. They launched a video before or near-to the release date of a big, highly-anticipated event like the release of a movie or a hot new technology product.

What makes Will It Blend? particularly interesting to me is that it successfully uses the power of viral video to actually MARKET a PRODUCT - something useful to observe for my readers and clients who are interested in the power of viral video to make actually moolah.

George Wright, who came up with Will It Blend? told Bloomberg that he had specific intent to fill the white space in our heads with this clever little campaign.

"Really our whole intent is brand awareness and market awareness," says Blendtec's Wright. "People will remember that there's a blender that will blend marbles if their blender isn't blending ice very well." He says Blendtec videos have been viewed more than 17 million times.

What do we learn from Blending Beautiful Technology and from Hilarious movie spoofs?

1. Find something that is highly-anticipated
2. Make a clever take on it.
3. Pony up for a real video - people want to forward these kinds of videos if they look like time and thought went into them.

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