Nike's 'Write the Future' commercial: a new viral ad record

With the FIFA World Cup rapidly approaching, Nike has made a superb new commercial. Famous football players such as Didier Drogba, Wayne Rooney and Christiano Ronaldo are joining the clip which is called 'Write the Future'. With its commercial, Nike responds to the craziness around the FIFA World Cup. The video shows the impact of decisions from soccer stars on the entire society, changing their own future and even influencing world events.

The Nike commercial set a new record for 'most views of a viral video advertisement in the first week of a campaign'. The "Write the Future" commercial reached 7.8 million views in its debut week and beat the previous record holder, another Nike advertisement called 'Earl and Tiger'. This clip, in which golfer Tiger Woods returned to sport after his heavily debated affairs, achieved 'only' 6.3 million views in its first week.

The Nike commercial is a nice example of a so-called 'viral video ad'. These are videos that become popular through the process of online sharing, often via video sharing websites (like YouTube) and e-mail. A viral video is often humoristic and typically passes electronically from person to person. It turns out that Youtube, which recently celebrated its 5th birthday, is a valuable platform to make viral advertisements like Nike's succesful.

You can find the Nike commercial below.



By the way, the soundtrack in the clip features the instrumental progressive rock song 'Hocus Pocus' by the Dutch band Focus, a personal favourite:)

Joining a TV commercial?

Your moment of fame on TV is closer than you think. Dutch manufacturer Duyvis has launched a campaign to bring a new taste of their traditional 'borrelnootjes' (nuts) to the attention. But this is not just a standard campaign, as Eric Wewerinke from Duyvis mentions:

"Because we combine social media with a TV commercial in our campaign, we offer all consumers the ultimate and unique opportunity to gain a role in our new commercial."

But how does it work?

Duyvis' marketing approach combines social media and TV commercials. The company is looking online for self-made actors who are willing to participate in their latest TV spot about the new taste: Red Pepper nuts. Fans and enthusiasts are able to upload their pictures 'in' the commercial via a special Hyves page, of which ultimately 200 unique versions actually will be broadcasted on TV. So contrary to other similar competitions in which there is often only one place available for the winner, the chance that you will appear on the TV screen is quite high. For the spots which will unfortunately not end up on TV, there is a special Duyvis YouTube channel in which they will be shown anyway.

It is a smart approach. Word of mouth marketing is almost insured, as those who are involved in the campaign will quickly share this with their fellows. Moreover, it is a nice example of reaching your target group through many different media, making use of the potential power of each of them.

The campaign will be explained in the following clip (in Dutch):

It's all about politics

The Dutch general elections will be held on June 9, 2010. So it's election time, and everybody should know it! It's generally known that the internet and social media have become very important in political campaigns, especially after the success of Barack Obama in his US campaign back in 2008. But the well-known phrase 'only in America' doesn't count here. This week it was announced that the the Dutch House of Representatives will participate in two different projects in which the internet and social media play a considerable role.

Missed debates

For everyone who unfortunately missed a debate: it will be possible to track them in your own time! Debates which are being held at the plenary hall of the Dutch House of Representatives will be presented on their own website.
Name of the project: 'Debat gemist' (in English: Debate missed). The format of this website will probably be comparable to the very popular website 'Uitzending gemist' (Broadcast missed).

Youtube channel

Dutch broadcaster NOS announced its cooperation with Youtube to create a Youtube channel, which they call 'Nederland kiest' (The Netherlands chooses). This channel makes it possible for Dutch citizens to ask questions to Dutch politicians through a video message. NOS editors will select the questions and then try to provide appropriate answers. The best questions will be answered by the political leaders themselves during the NOS debate, which will be broadcasted on June 8.

The Dutch House of Representatives as well as NOS editor in chief Hans Laroes and Youtube head of communications Alistair Verney stressed the importance to experiment with social media in politics. For citizens, it becomes more and more easy to create a direct 'question and answer dialogue' with politicians. As a result, citizens become more involved and politics becomes more accessible. Let's hope this remains the case, even after the elections...