YouTube Sensation

When looking at successful YouTube video campaigns there are many different tactics that work. We’re going to take a look at one advertising campaign that was particularly successful.

Old Spice: The Man Your Man Could Smell Like

This is a video that uses a simple but elusive tactic: humor. When it comes to the internet and YouTube in particular, funny wins. Everyone will pass on funny videos to each other. So if your video can be funny enough to make people want to share it with their friends, then you just make be able to get your video to go viral. What exactly did Old Spice do? They created a video campaign staring a ridiculously handsome ladies’ man telling women that he was the man their man could smell like. The videos were hilarious, quotable, and an instant internet sensation. Check it out here.

Just releasing videos like this one would have been a great success; however, Old Spice took it one step further. They created a Twitter account for their ladies’ man, and released hundreds of very short video responses to comments left on YouTube and Twitter. Giving the campaign a personal touch made it go from good to great. Here are some statistics on how the campaign went (All statistics from August of 2010).

• On day 1 the campaign received almost 6 million views
(that’s more than Obama’s victory speech)
• On day 2 old spice had 8 of the 11 most popular videos online
• On day 3 the campaign had reached over 20 million views
• After the first week old spice had over 40 million views
• The old spice twitter following increased 2700% (probably off a lowish base)
• Facebook fan interaction was up 800%
• Oldspice.com website traffic was up 300%
• The old spice YouTube channel became the all-time most viewed channel (amazing)
• The campaign has generated 1.4 billion impressions since launching the ads 6 months ago
• The campaign increased sales by 27% over 6 months since launching
• In the last 3 months sales were up 55%
• And in the last month sales were up 107% from the social responses campaign work

                                            Old spice is now the #1 body wash brand for men.

The Old Spice campaign is probably one of the most success advertising campaigns of all-time. In the end all Old Spice did was create a funny video that got people talking, and capitalized on it. It’s also important to realize that if you create a YouTube video or series, you probably will not have as much success as Old Spice. Though it’s possible, it’s not the norm. Creating something funny is one of the most consistent ways to get positive responses from YouTube.

There is also a YouTube case study of the Old Spice campaign here.