AdAge and Visible Measures reports that this Burger King “Square Butts” Spongebob parody of “Big Butts” is the third most “viral” commercial of the week.
And this makes me so very sad.
Tag Archives: burger king
Burger King P’wns McDonalds in Viral Video
When we weren’t having “my dad can beat up your dad” debates as children, we had the “Burger King versus McDonalds” debate. Of course, now I go wherever my kids tell me because they’re not going to eat a thing anyway until the meal toys are edible.
But the WillVideoForFood 2008 “Fast Food Online-Video Award” goes to… Burger King. Don’t get me wrong- the freaky masked Burger King’s appearances in TV ads gave me Wes Craven nightmares too. But at least the brand’s recent online-video campaign “Cavalcade” makes sense (and I’m not even a Family Guy addict).
Seriously- this McDonalds “The Reality House” series is a classic example of a brand’s futile attempt to develop its own content on a desert island… it’s as tired as the old lady rapping. It’s as perplexing as McDonald’s first commercial. Contrast that with Burger King’s Seth MacFarlane Cavalcade program, which was a smart use of YouTube, a visible and high-engagement promotion for Burger King, and a brilliant way to leverage a known creator while “fishing where the fish are.” The deal involved a generous check to Seth (not to mention that the deal grew his own onlie audience), a healthy InVideo and homepage BK media spend on YouTube, and brief pre-roll promotion that didn’t interfere with the entertainment- in fact it was illustrated by Seth (or more likely outsourced child cartoonists that got axed by Martha Stewart).
For the love of God, agencies, please stop trying to create custom-branded programming with names like Menuaire, or expensive microsites packed with overly-baked video content. The result is that nobody cares, and then giant media budgets must be diverted to drive traffic to easily forgotten destination sites. If you’re buying Dove banner ads to engage consumers around natural beauty, that makes some sense (as long as you don’t run ’em against uploaded Ax ads). But please don’t promote a Dove web series written by frustrated screen writers slaving helplessly under the oppresive reign of a thick-accented agency creative executive with bad breath and untreated ADHD.
I’d rather see those ad dollars getting us to eat more burgers. I’m all about engaging customers with entertainment, but do it with people that know the medium or have proven they can draw a crowd. And put the billboards on a highway rather than erecting giant signs that say, “exit here to watch a mildly entertaining advertisement.”
When P&G wanted to access stay-at-home moms, they didn’t started a new branded entertainment network scripted by brand managers that spent more time with their heads in excel sheets than facing television sets. They convinced the big networks to write soap operas, left the writes alone to hydrate the insatiable drama thirst of moms, and jammed the shows full of ads. Today’s version might have involve product integration (her tragic car accident was a result of restless knee syndrome), but the model is fairly time-tested and simple:
- Promotion takes a quiet backseat to novel entertainment or nobody engages
- The content goes where people are already hanging… it’s extremely hard to compel someone to leave YouTube for advertainment.
- Leverage people who know the medium and have proven they can draw crowds in online-video (or in Seth’s case, leverage recognizable equity from television).
Just because entry costs to content production have dropped doesn’t mean brands should become entertainers. The result is often like watching a wedding slide show with cheesy Powerpoint transitions and random dissolves. Or that flier that screams “hey- I just learned desktop publishing, and look how many fonts and clip art I squeezed onto an 8.5×11!”
Brands Looking for Good Video Content Are Smoking Acid
It’s very obvious to advertisers to buy media that interupts popular television shows. Supply/demand creates expensive spots for the Superbowl, and bargain prices for reruns of Full House.
But when branded entertainment became vogue, someone smoked bad acid and promoted a ridiculous concept. Get the sponsor before launching a show, and sell ’em based on the quality of the content. This assumes that agencies and video producers know what content will become popular and influential, (and worse yet that advertisering sponsors can). Wrong. Wrong. Who could have predicted ANYONE in the top 10 most-subscribed YouTube list? Who could have predicted that I’d be a most-viewed YouTube comedian, for crying out loud? And yes I know people don’t smoke acid, jerk.
GoDaddy took a sole sponsorship on “Internet Superstar” (a very clever show that’s now RIP). I loved the show, but I also recognize that — for reasons that elude me — audiences don’t flock to a well-produced show about the other video stars and shows. It similarly perplexes me that Pepsi-backed PopTub hasn’t yet developed a larger audience, but perhaps the “Entertainment Tonight of online video” defies the niche nature of online video (then again, I laughed when I saw magazines about the Internet, and some have survived).
Don’t get me wrong. I believe GoDaddy picked well with Internet Superstar, and that Pepsi found a good show on PopTub. But it’s easy and unwise to pitch an idea, get backing, and then search for an audience with the sponsor’s money.
I’d take a more pragmatic approach as an advertiser. I would promote via what people watch and not what “the suits” and focus groups predict will be hot. That means I’d partner with something as inane as Fred (assuming I felt confident that his bit had staying power). And if I found a brilliant concept (iChannel) that hadn’t garnered an audience, I’d let someone else fund their launch. As I said, online-video popularity is not about talent alone.
An exception, of course, would be Burger King sponsoring content by a known animator (Seth Mac Farlane) that is getting traction because audiences like Seth’s style, and BK is pumping it with ad dollars. And who wouldn’t rather watch “Seth sellout” rather than Burger King commercials on a Burger King YouTube channel?
But when a popular YouTuber spawns a spinoff channel, it often develops a quick following without ad dollars to pimp it or a well-known offline personality.
- MrSafety‘s relatively new “Mean Kitty” channel is about to surpass me in subscribers.
- What The Buck Show host, Michael Buckley, has an extremely popular channel where all he does is vlog.
- Another spinoff (BamBamKaBoosh) amassed 50,000 subscribers in days without any videos — just because popular creators promoted it.
- Show me an agency that has developed video content and garnered such a fast and loyal audience without promoting it (with ads that might be better served to sell their product not a lame show).
Now the power of being a sole sponsor is far greater than an interruption ad, and these programs shouldn’t be evaluated on a basis of total views but on the impact of the views (not CPM, folks, but Dynamic Logic pre/post awareness and attitude trackers).
I’d rather have a small product placement on the most popular YouTube channel than be the sole backer of an amazing show that’s in search for an audience. Even in branded entertainment, follow the crowds unless you’re extremely confident you can create your own.
What Is the Purpose of a Video Ad?
There are really four distinct ad formats on YouTube, the online-video site with the lion’s share: display, text ads, InVideo ads, and video ads (10-30 seconds). Unlike most sites, YouTube forbids preroll, but does offer full-motion video ads if the user fires the player (in the home-page ads or in display areas).
So let’s talk about your advertiser’s goal for each, and then let’s give a good case study.
- Display: Your display ad (a flat graphic) should primarily brand since 95 percent of people will not experience anymore than that. However if you want click-thrus of greater than a fraction of a percent, then have a good call-to-action. Nothing sells like more video content — especially if it’s non promotional.
- Text: Text ads are dirt cheap, but largely ignored. However you can brand on these and run them CPM (cost per thousand), but the ad will eventually fall aside to CPC (cost-per-click) ads that are more profitable and maybe more relevant. So the smart thing to do is be extremely targeted and buy specific keywords, then have a specific call-to-action.
- InVideo: InVideo ads remain novel, and give the advertiser the “hard to ignore” exposure of a banner that bursts into the video’s bottom 20%. Usually these are sold with accompanying display ads adjacent to the video. Here’s a good chance to brand (again- even a high click through will be in the low single digits). So focus on branding, but invite people to see more content.
- Full-motion video ad: Here’s an opportunity to entertain, brand, and invite people (if necessary) to the next step of the sales cycle (for more content and commerce).
The bottom-line is that advertising against online-video means you have to engage the viewer in an entertaining format. Don’t expect many people to leave my CharlieCam video to buy a helmet cam (even though I am rather impressed with instant targeting last night by a commerce site). Instead, promote more content. ZipIt Wireless (which sells a device and service for instant messaging) used YouTube’s Fred in ads, and invited people back to a campaign site (FredOnZipIt) to see more videos. My guess is that about 2-4 percent of viewers (in the early part of the campaign) visited the campaign site, and of those maybe 5 percent purchased ZipIt devices (wild guess).
Did that math work for ZipIt? I notice ZipIt’s ads aren’t popping up on Fred’s videos or elsewhere, so maybe not… or perhaps the company is assessing results. Either way, this campaign was in the right direction — use content to lure the potential customer, and then expose them further to the product or service (in a web experience that can do that in ways television can’t).
Now look at the Burger King campaign for an even better case study. It’s an integrated campaign between a comedy show and a fast-food restaurant which might otherwise have a tough time getting people to engage in a branded experience.
Burger King is sponsoring Seth Macfarlane’s “Cavalcade of Cartoon Comedy.” Although the creator of Family Guy produces edgy stuff far more risque than much of the YouTube amateur Partner content, it’s instantly recognized.
Macfarlane also probably made a good choice to align with Burger King, because he sure wasn’t going to cover production costs of his short web series via ad-sharing through online video. And he’s also enjoying the publicity that Burger King is making for him.
It’s another page out of the Star Wars Happy Meal promotion playbook, but a good reminder that online-video is growing up.