On the #1 position of Viral Friday is for OK Go – Needing / Getting, an awesome music video featuring Chevy.  The #2 goes to a powerful Old Spice – Bounce, that basically takes over other commercials. And Flash Fans completes this week’s top 3, bringing a surprising support and cheering to recreational hockey teams.

Do you want to see this week’s list from 1 to 5? Go on then, and have a look! We’d like to hear your opinion about the virals. Have fun!

Get our ViralBlog asset: the Viral Friday Widget! By default the widget shows you the latest Viral Friday, but it’ll also show you the seven most recent postings on ViralBlog.

1. OK Go – Needing/Getting

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Did you ever imagine a car playing guitar or piano? Prepare yourself, because it is possible. The guys from OK Go have returned with another video in a partnership with Chevrolet, this time it’s for their track “Needing/Getting” and it’s indeed surprising. Recorded across a couple of miles in the desert outside of LA, the band set up 1,000 instruments and customized a Chevy Sonic with retractable pneumatic arms designed to play the instruments as they speed past them. And in the meantime the band would be singing and playing other musical instrument inside the car. Damian Kulash (lead vocals and guitar) even took stunt driving lessons to be up to the challenge. Check some behind the scenes footage and of course the video. In 5 days this video hit more than 10,6 million views. Let us know what you think of it!

2. Old Spice – Bounce

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Even though the battle of Old Spice guys may seem over, the “new” Old Spice Guy – Terry Crews that talks in CAPS LOCK, proves that Old Spice is so powerful that it just pops out in other commercials.
And this is not just a onetime incident, also Charmin from Procter & Gamble was “invaded”. The new advertising campaign “Smell is Power” by Wieden+Kennedy features a total of five commercials and they’re doing pretty well – “Bounce” has already more than 3,6 million views and “Charmin” is close to 1 million views, both uploaded on 1st of February. That’s what I call P-p-p-p-pp-POWER!

3. Flash Fans

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In Canada they watch the Superbowl as well. But since Canadians are more hockey fans, Budweiser decided to air a commercial specifically for the Canadian market. This movie is all about an old-fashioned flash-mob. Two recreational hockey teams were asked to participate in a documentary but once the filming got started, they were suprised by a thousand viewers, cheerleaders and lots of confetti. French prankster Rémi Gaillard did a similar thing with two soccer-teams in 2010, but who cares. The Budweiser flash-mob got 3 million views since the start of February.

4. A Day Made of Glass

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20 years ago we dreamed of flying cars and hovering skateboards but today we’ve let that go. We’re moving towards displays, like Samsung teased us a couple of weeks ago. Now glass and ceramics company Corning Incorporated has made a great video giving us a glimpse of what the future might bring to us. The video was put live the 3rd of February and currently has over 630,000 views.
Take a look at Corning’s YouTube channel for more futuristic videos.

5. Lego Captain America

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For years Lego has been an inspiration to many video uploaders on the net. It’s not just for kids anymore, it has become the ultimate construction toy for geeks. Even the Bible got Legofied. If you combine Lego with a DC Comics character like Captain America you can be sure of a winning viral in your hands. Add some extreme violence to the scenes and there you have your half million views in just 1 week.  So Lego Captain America is this week’s number 5, but beware: viewer discretion is advised.

CMOs integrate social media in their current strategies and are looking beyond sales, which indicates they understand the value of social media. Sounds nice but how do you measure the return on investment?

Whether or not to enter the social space is not even a question anymore. Even if you don’t want to be there your audience most likely will be in that space, talking about your brand. These days the question is towards the ROI of social media. Setting up a whole social media team is quite frightening for brands, because how do you measure the KPI’s and will this directly be shown in the sales numbers?

MDG Advertising made this nice video showing how the industry is measuring the ROI of social media.

Click here to view the embedded video.

MDG Advertising answers the question CMOs are having: how do you measure the ROI of social media? In short, every business has different objectives so there is no standard measurement.

So what is important to know then? Well, having clear business objectives may be an open door but is most certainly essential. Forrester recognizes this as well and recommends 4 factors to consider to measure the ROI of social media:

1. Financial
   Have costs decreased or sales increased?
2. Brand
   Have perceptions of the brand improved?
3. Risk Management
   Are you better prepared to respond to issues that affect brand reputation?
4. Digital
   Has the brand enhanced its digital assets?

The 4 factors indicated above are really relevant, however it only matters if the results are monitored. So yes, it’s really important to set up clear brand and business objectives but don’t forget to keep track of it all.

How do you measure the ROI of your social media efforts? Let us know in the comments below.

Source: Measuring The ROI Of Social Media photo from Shutterstock, MDG Advertising

The Super Bowl Showdown Between Advertisers

Check out the list of all commercials of Super Bowl Sunday and let us know which is your favourite and why!

Phone Innovators: Official 2012 Best Buy Game Day Commercial

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Coke 2012 Commercial: “Superstition”

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Bridgestone – Performance Football

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Budweiser – Return of the King

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Free to Pee – TaxACT Super Commercial

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Chevrolet – Happy Grad

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Doritos – Man’s Best Friend — Crash the Super Bowl 2012 Finalist

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Disney – John Carter Super Bowl Ad

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The Dog Strikes Back: 2012 Volkswagen Game Day Commercial

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AGT – Howard Stern

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Official David Beckham Bodywear for H&M Super Bowl Ad

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Coke 2012 Commercial: “Catch” Starring NE_Bear

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Chevy Sonic “Stunt Anthem” – Chevy Super Bowl XLVI Ads

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Marvel – The Avengers Super Bowl XLVI Commercial

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Teleflora Super Bowl Ad – Adriana Lima 2012

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Cars.com 2012 Super Bowl Ad – Confident You

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Doritos – Sling Baby – Crash the Super Bowl 2012 Finalist

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NEW E*TRADE Baby Game Day Commercial – Fatherhood

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G.I. Joe: Retaliation Super Bowl Spot Official 2012

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Camry Effect: “Connections”

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Hulu Plus Super Bowl Commercial – Huluboratory

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The Voice – Vocal Kombat

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OFFICIAL Clint Eastwood Chrysler Commercial – It’s Halftime in America

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Smash

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FIAT 500 Abarth – 2012 Super Bowl Commercial – Seduction

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Toyota Camry 2012 Big Game :30 Commercial – It’s Reinvented

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Coke 2012 Commercial: “Arghh” featuring NY_Bear

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Dannon Oikos Greek Yogurt Super Bowl 2012 Commercial – “The Tease”

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Century 21 Real Estate LLC: Final Super Bowl Ad

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Acura – Transactions: 2012 NSX Big Game Seinfeld Commercial

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Budweiser – Eternal Optimism

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Bridgestone – Performance Basketball

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NFL Timeline

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Official 2012 Honda CR-V Game Day Commercial – “Matthew’s Day Off”

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MetLife – “Everyone” Game Day Commercial

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Act of Valor Superbowl Ad

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“Think Fast” – Official Big Game Ad for Hyundai Genesis Coupe

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Bud Light – Rescue Dog

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Time Warner Cable – Enjoy Better Anthem

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2012 Kia Optima Big Game Full Commercial

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CareerBuilder 2012 Big Game Commercial

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Thursday Comedies – Crank

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Samsung Mobile USA – Thing Called Love

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Prudential Financial – Day One-Linda Gutherie

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Swamp People Super Bowl Ad

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NFL Fantasy Million Dollar Fan

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Awake – Which is Which?

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Cadillac ATS – “Green Hell” Super Bowl XLVI Commercial

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QR Code Super Bowl 2012 Commercial

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Suzuki “Sled” 2012 Super Bowl Ad

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Football (Chase QuickPay)

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M&M’S “Just My Shell” Super Bowl Commercial

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Image: Shutterstock
Source: Mashable

Last week on ViralBlog among others “KLM’s Meet & Seat Social Seating Is Live”, “Why CMOs Will Focus On Social Media Metrics?” and “Top 10 Social Media Blogs: The 2012 Winners!”.

Mexican Football Team Managed By Its Fans

Recently we mentioned the very first article on ViralBlog written by our founder Igor Beuker, who announced, after his subscription to MyFootballclub.co.uk, that he proudly became, along with 50,000 other fans, the club owner of Ebbsfleet United. But guess what Igor! Mexico Second division club Murcielagos takes it even further! The club has no coach; instead…. the team is fully managed by its fans!

Top 10 Social Media Blogs: The 2012 Winners!

In December 2011 we found out that ViralBlog was nominated to Top 10 Social Media Blogs 2012 at Social Media Examiner. Earlier this month we were among the Top 20 Finalists and waited impatiently for the results. On the 30th of January the winners were announced, and guess what?! Thanks to you we made it!

Why CMOs Will Focus On Social Media Metrics?

In 2012 CMOs will focus more on social media metrics, says eMarketer. We do believe that content is king, distribution is queen but metrics is the emperor… The eMarketer study shows that CMOs were focusing on soft metrics in 2011, and feel they can’t gauge ROI.

Sign Of The Times: Zeitgeist By Slideshare

SlideShare is an active and engaging community where people post their thoughts on marketing, business, best practice or anything the community wants. In the above SlideShare presentation they give an overview of 2011 and analyse and share their summary. Below a short recap of this presentation and insights that struck me the most.

The Next Social Wave Of 2012: Pinterest

Pinterest, a social visual network that was launched back in March 2010. While the site is still invite-only it’s been very popular among their 4 million users logging 421 million page views, according to The Next Web. Of course Pinterest isn’t on par with smashing numbers like 800 million Facebook users or 465 million Twitter users. The invite-only system is keeping the Pinterest eco-system small for the time being, but is it ready to fully open their doors to the public in 2012?

Viral Friday: Matthew’s Day Off

A weekly viral video chart of ViralBlog, showing the 5 most popular viral videos, commercials, games or user-generated videos, carefully selected and ranked by popularity, viral impact & spread.

Mobile Gaming: State Of The European Market

The Mobile Gaming is still growing, not only in the USA but also on the “Old” continent, Europe. This comes hand in hand with the increasing penetration of smart-phones and Mobile Media. These are the findings from comScore‘s report Mobile Gaming: State of the European Market, having a deep look on the details how Europeans use their smart-phones.

KLM’s Meet & Seat Social Seating Is Live

Last year we told you that KLM would launch its social seating service in 2012. Well, Meet & Seat is live now. Facebook and LinkedIn users can now meet interesting passengers on their flight. Check the video below… What is Meet & Seat? Our industry tends to call it social seating. As seen at i.e. TicketMaster before.

What is Meet & Seat? Our industry tends to call it social seating. As seen at i.e. TicketMaster before.

Meet & Seat lets you find out about interesting people who will be on board of your KLM flight, such as other passengers attending the same event as you at your destination…

How does it work?

Simply share your Facebook or LinkedIn profile through the KLM Booking Engine. Next, check other passengers’ profile details and where they’ll be sitting.

Meet & Seat is a new service and now available for:
- Bookings with 1 passenger
- KLM flights between Amsterdam and New York, San Francisco and Sao Paulo
- From 90 days until 48 hours before departure

KLM is working on making its social seating service available on other KLM flights as well.

The cool thing about KLM? They have been using social media in a smart way for almost 2 years, in a very innovative way.

But more important, KLM is more dedicated than many other brands, to use social media and social technologies to add relevancy and meaningfulness to the lives of its clients.

Where most brands are on a tactical level, chasing social channels just to reach people with their social ads, KLM is taking the strategic approach, taking social way beyond advertising.

So where most brands have embraced social advertising, KLM is CRM driven, and using social to its fans through the funnel – towards trial, loyalty and advocacy.

So social branding should be all about building mutual beneficial relationships between people and brands. And that’s why many CMOs need to unthink the way they have been social until today.

KLM might be able a brand to follow and analyze, chasing social channels to reach consumers might be what CMOs should leave to their Media Managers and Media agencies?

In my opinion the last 2 mentioned, should be aware that by its nature brand advertising has always been interruptive, distracting, selfish, one-way mind-jacking…

Nowadays, digital and social branding means that consumers are more critical towards too many overpromising ads. Modern consumers are digital dictators that expects brands to add meaningfulness to their lives as well.

So here lies a concrete action point for the CMOs; adding that relevancy and pieces of meaningfulness.

See my former articles about KLM here: KLM Social Seating, Fly2Miami, Community Strategy and Fly For Fortune.

Please share your opinion on KLM, brand advertising or meaningfulness in the comments below.

These are the findings from comScore‘s report Mobile Gaming: State of the European Market, having a deep look on the details how Europeans use their smart-phones.

First of all it’s about the market share of smart-phones in Europe – the acquisition of new devices . The mobile media population has grown 22% on the year-on-year basis and now there are more than 100 million users. Since December 2010, the smart-phones are bought more often than “regular” mobile devices.

The battle of smart-phones operating systems share has it’s winners and loosers as well – with the rapid decline of Symbian, rise of Android from Google and almost stable market share of Apple, which has around one fifth of the share.

When looking on the demographic profile of the gamers and types of games, it’s not surprising that young, heavily male audience plays action/adventure, RPG, sports and first person shooter games.

Puzzles, card games, quizzes and board games attract an older audience and it’s more evenly spread between genders. And musical and strategy games have a younger, more female demographic.

Mobile gamers are not really “hardcore gamers” but over 25% played a game in the month, what counts for 62 million consumers. But of course there are users that game almost every day, that counts for nearly 13 million users.

When it comes to interaction, the in-game ads reach almost 40% of the mobile gamers. In combination with the demographics data, it’s much easier to target the ads to the specific audience.

15% of mobile gamers spend money for virtual goods such as cash, points, tokens or gifts, also to buy upgrades, new game levels and so. The most frequent purchases are for cash points and tokens (almost 50%) and virtual goods on the second place.

And an infographic for those who like the numbers visualized – Geekaphone has taken an in depth look at the numbers and stats behind the mobile gaming industry. However, for sure check the complete comScore report – the link is in the bottom of the article.

Do you personally play mobile games and in case yes, which do you like the best? And for businesses – as the market share of smart-phones is still rising, did you consider creating a game to spread word about your products and services or it’s already out there?

Happy gaming!

Sources: comScore – Mobile Gaming: State of the European Market , Geekaphone

On the #1 position of Viral Friday is Matthew’s Day Off, how do you handle work on a perfect day? The #2 goes to an amazing concept car Acura NSX in “Transactions“.
And Flying People In New York City completes this week’s top 3, with a great idea on the next level of RC models.

Do you want to see this week’s list from 1 to 5? Go on then, and have a look! We’d like to hear your opinion about the virals. Have fun!

Get our ViralBlog asset: the Viral Friday Widget! By default the widget shows you the latest Viral Friday, but it’ll also show you the seven most recent postings on ViralBlog.

1. “Matthew’s Day Off”

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It can be said that this year’s Super Bowl viral winner is this video from Honda featuring Matthew Broderick. The spot makes multiple references to the classic movie Ferris Bueller’s day off with a bunch of catchy phrases and even singing at a parade. The movie came out back in 1986 but the last generation will definitely remember the brilliant references, smart targeting by Honda. Two days before the Super Bowl the views count up to more than 8 million and the teaser “Coming soon” with more than 5 million views.

2. “Transactions” Acura NSX #JerrysNSX

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The runner up of the Super Bowl car commercials battle is from Acura, promoting it’s amazing dream car – the Acura NSX concept, featuring Jerry Seinfeld and Jay Leno, desperately trying to be the first owner of the concept, willing to do almost everything to get it. How desperate would you be to get the first NSX? While the video is long it’s able to retain attention with Jerry’s funny jokes. With more than 7,5 million views in three days, Acura hit the spot.

3. Flying People In New York City

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Alien invasion? Flying humans in The Big Apple? Well technically the supposedly ‘flying people’ are actually human shaped RC planes. There’s more to the video than you would think, it’s not just a cool viral. This video is actually promoting the sci-fi movie Chronicle. A very smart way to promote a movie, but they could’ve done more by providing a clear call to action. Right now a lot of people probably will not make the connection to the movie, missed opportunity. Definitely viral material though, in 5 days it has almost 5,5 million views.

4. The Dog Strikes Back

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Are you a fan of Super Bowl? Are you looking forward to the advertising spectacle taking place between plays?  As a follow up to last year’s successful The Force , Volkswagen released their 2012 Game Day commercial, featuring a dog who gets inspired by a red VW Beetle to get in shape. With The Bark Side teaser trailer, everybody was expecting more Star Wars action. If you watch the first half of the commercial, it has absolutely nothing to do with Star Wars.

The Star Wars scene doesn’t come in until the second half and even then the surprise appearance feels like  an obligation to meet the expectations from last year’s commercial. Still, Volkswagen manages to gain 2 million views in 5 days. Star Wars may be still interesting, but maybe time to find a new theme?

5. David Beckham Bodywear For H&M

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Swedish retailer H&M recently dropped its first-ever, 30-second, Super Bowl ad for its collaboration line with British soccer star David Beckham. The music “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood” by The Animals, marks the rhythm for David Beckham to present his own underwear line for H&M. And there is no space for misunderstanding: David Beckham is simply hot. For Super Bowl ad agencies and their creative teams spent  hours trying to find innovative ways to market their products in an impactful way. Clothing retailer H&M apparently decided it would be far easier to have Mr. Beckham half naked.

The ad will run in the second quarter of the game this Sunday. It already has gone viral with more than 580.000 views since the 26th of January. Meanwhile, David Beckham’s H&M Bodywear line will hit 1,800 H&M stores worldwide on February 2.

Of course Pinterest isn’t on par with smashing numbers like 800 million Facebook users or 465 million Twitter users. The invite-only system is keeping the Pinterest eco-system small for the time being, but is it ready to fully open their doors to the public in 2012?

Before we dive into the added value of Pinterest, let’s first take a look what it actually offers.

What is Pinterest?

A place where users can organize and share online photos. Think of it as the evolution of social bookmarking sites like Delicious. But it goes way beyond a bookmarking site, it’s the visual aspect that really makes the difference. Images can be uploaded or shared on Pinterest, this is called a ‘Pin’. These pins can be categorized by user defined categories, also known as ‘Boards’.

Another added layer is the ability to comment, like and share photos. Users can follow each other like Twitter, no need to give permission as it’s an open network. Pins can also be shared on Facebook and Twitter.

How is it currently used?

It depends on the user but it’s safe to say there’s a big difference between brand and personal users. For personal experience Pinterest seems widely popular for designers, architects and travellers. Think of a showcase of your own work or those beautiful places you always wanted to visit.

For brands it can be a very natural environment to be in. Take Etsy for example, an e-commerce website focused on handmade or vintage items as well as art and craft supplies. Etsy brought their catalogue to the Pinterest audience, and why wouldn’t they since the Pinterest audience is 70% female. Sounds like a perfect match to me.

Why brands should stay on top of Pinterest

No doubt about it that Pinterest wouldn’t match every brand. As a matter of fact it seems that mostly small retail businesses are using Pinterest to inspire, showcase and sell their products.

However, think about this for a minute. There’s a huge potential if Pinterest steps off from their invite-only registration model, gaining millions of new users. This means people will start ‘pinning’ what they love, and most certainly branded products will be in there as well.

Think of Fashionistas, showcasing all their Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Prada bags. You name it, they will Pin it. Fashion brands can really start adding value in this space by showing more than just pictures of products. Show how different bags can fit each specific occasion.

In other words, lots of new opportunities for brands to reach and engage their consumers.

How do you think Pinterest can add value for brands? Let us know in the comments below.

Source: The Next Web

In the above SlideShare presentation they give an overview of 2011 and analyse and share their summary. Below a short recap of this presentation and insights that struck me the most.

To start off with what struck me the most is that even though women are the most active in communities and on social channels; on slideshare the men seem to be posting the majority of content.  Probably due to the reason that men use it work related and this is endorsed by the most popular keywords: business, marketing, design, research, internet etcetera.

My thought on this is that this will change over time; I really believe that woman will dominate the marketing industry eventually. Men used to have the buying power, so advertising was aimed at men… but think about it: who has the most spending power and which group has the highest engagement levels…?

When we take a look at the globe, people do not really think the Dutch as a force necessarily to be reckoned with: however the Dutch rank the highest (I mean a global #1 position) on Twitter and within SlideShare they have the 3^rd place in the highest usage of slides (US is nowhere to be found). These Dutchies have always been known for their innovation, knowledge, mercantilism and their…horticulture

Thanks to SlideShare and their active community we can gain insights into marketing, development, learn how to do stuff and get a grasp of the vision people have on the world.

Here the most popular business presentation on slideshare:

 
SlideShare increases traffic to your site, offers you a possibility to include a clear call to action that provides you with HOT leads and just as important; gives you the opportunity to position yourself as an authority in your field.

Inspiring, informing and activating business professionals over the world.

Are you sharing your slides?

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