about Coke and obesity written by the newspaper would be from one that was paid for by the soda company.12
Some of these categories are more driven by stealth than others, and not all marketing will be covert. It cannot be: we have to have some familiarity with a product in order for covert methods to work. That is why these methods rarely exist as standalone communications, but rather as part of an overall campaign.
Procter & Gamble’s “Thank You Mom” campaign provides a helpful case study to see how the integration of online and offline, as well as of stealth and visible methods, can make a marketing effort effective. As part of this initiative, P&G bought traditional television commercials. These ads were originally created for the 2012 Olympics, and creatively they pull at the heartstrings by showing mothers from around the world doing tireless work in support of their children’s athletic careers. Prior to the TV advertising, the campaign started with unpaid media online in the form of a video called “Best Job,” which introduced the campaign and which became “a digital sensation.”
The commercials and video were followed by an integrated segment (paid product placement) on NBC’s The Today Show. According to a document from P&G’s advertising agency: “Throughout the broadcast, the cast referenced the online popularity of ‘Best Job,’ aired the full 2-minute version within programming and additionally aired the :60 version in the ‘A’ position during the commercial break. The pièce de résistance was a P&G executive appearing on the show to surprise moms of Olympians with a financial gift to help them get to London (based on the insight that many families couldn’t afford the trip).”13
Throughout the Olympic Games, social media (unpaid) was used in the form of a Thank You Mom Facebook page, a Twitter handle (@ThankYouMom), and YouTube videos. P&G created Facebook and Twitter pages to give mothers around the world an opportunity to post pictures of themselves with their children, and thus to create an emotional connection with the brand. In addition, athletes from around the world—many with extensive followings—posted thanks to their mothers. YouTube videos presented winning athletes and their moms. Some footage for these videos came from NBC, which agreed as part of the sponsorship contract to capture shots of mothers reacting to their children’s wins and losses.
This outlines just some of the paid and unpaid methods that P&G used to grab our attention by pulling on our emotions. Some of these methods were stealth (the Today Show mentions, the mom footage as part of the Olympics), and much of it depended on consumer word of mouth. In terms of consumer engagement, there were 17 million views on YouTube, Facebook fans increased by 65 percent, and Twitter followers increased by 20 percent. The “Best Job” video was shared during the Olympics more than any other advertising, making it the most viral.
In total, “Thank You Mom” became the most successful campaign in the company’s 175-year history, leading to more than $200 million in incremental sales. Like many marketing campaigns, a mix of media types, both covert and obvious, worked in conjunction with one another to bolster awareness and promote sales. For example, showing mothers in the stands at the Olympics is not outright advertising. However, throughout a hundred-day period leading up to the Olympics, consumers were bombarded with messages connecting moms and P&G. It stands to reason that many would think of the marketer’s advertising after seeing these images and then, once inspired, were led to talk about it or retweet it or post their own picture on Facebook in response to it.
WORD OF MOUTH STRATEGIES
VIRAL
In Contagious, Wharton professor Jonah Berger outlines what causes a video—or any other content—to be passed from one person to another. According to Berger, content goes viral because of the acronym STEPPS: Social Currency, Triggers, Emotion, Public, Practical Value, and Stories. Much of this is not new. People like to share what they know in order to look cool or to become the go-to person for the latest info. That information is a form of social capital that gives one standing in a group, what we used to call “water cooler talk.” It could be that you know what happened on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon last night, or that Prince played a live performance in a tiny venue in town. Triggers are reminders that lead us to talk about things around us. In the P&G case above, seeing moms react to their children winning an Olympic event is a trigger for us to think about the campaign. You likely know from your own experience that if something moves you in either a good or bad way, you comment on it or review it. It is emotions that drive these actions, and awe and anger are the emotions that are most likely to lead us to share content. Tied to triggers is the concept of making the private public. Bright yellow Livestrong bracelets, for example, made charity a public issue, and white earbuds made people using iPods visually stand out from the crowd. We might also share practical information like a recipe, or a video (maybe you’ve seen it) on how to correctly shuck an ear of corn. Finally, people share stories. Just as Leo Burnett knew that he needed to connect products to characters within a larger story, today marketers attach their products to a larger narrative that consumers can pass on to others.
There are many, many viral video examples that could have been used for this category. P&G’s Always campaign called “Like a Girl,” which also appeared as a commercial in the Super Bowl; “The Devil Baby” for the film Devil’s Due; any of the many John Oliver videos that act as promotion for his weekly HBO show. Here I have selected “Hey Minions Fans!” for AMC Movie Theaters and “The First Kiss” to highlight Berger’s thesis. In part, I’ve selected the latter because it takes the idea of obscuring who’s behind the content to decidedly new levels.
Anyone with young children likely knows that “Minions” are the adorable animated characters from the Despicable Me movie franchise. In this video created for the holiday season, a group of Minions singing “Silent Night” are interrupted from their calm refrain by a more rambunctious Minion who leads the group in singing “Jingle Bells.” Connected to the video is the message that if you purchase a $30 gift card to AMC (presumably for a friend), you will receive free popcorn for yourself. This video was viewed more than 65 million times and shared on Facebook almost 4 million times, but it only had about a thousand Twitter shares. It was a no-brainer that families and friends would share this video among themselves, because passing this along to others gave kids and their parents social currency: it’s an adorable piece of content and gave them something to talk about. The entertaining video evoked joy, as well as provided a practical incentive through the offer associated with it.
Even more viral was “First Kiss,” the most viewed video advertising of 2014. In this beautifully shot black and white video, several couples—gay and straight, old and young—are introduced to each other for the very first time and asked to kiss while being filmed. The couples are understandably uneasy: they ask each other’s names, they shake hands, they ponder how to start the process of locking lips with someone they’ve met only moments before. “First Kiss” does not present itself as advertising. The only indication that this is a piece of commercial content is a title on the screen in the upper left corner for about one second at the very beginning that says “WREN presents.” This is followed by a screen that says, “FIRST KISS a film by Tatia Pilieva,” language that suggests that this is an artistic work rather than an advertisement. Most people had never heard of the apparel company, Wren, so this did not initially register as advertising.
“First Kiss” has more than 156 million views on YouTube and spawned dozens of video parodies. The total number of Facebook shares for this video, at 1.5 million, was much lower than for the Minions video, but there were 74,000 shares on Twitter (a considerable number for that venue), with most of these happening within the first month of its release. Twitter tends to be a more adult and more business-oriented social media platform, and it is not surprising that marketers, for example, would share this with others as a form of social currency. The film itself
