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26 February 2014

Old Spice Social Media: Lessons From Their 2010 Social Media Campaign

Old Spice Social Media

Old Spice Social Media

In 2010, Old Spice launched one of the most memorable and subsequently successful social media based creative marketing campaigns the internet had ever seen. The endurance and longevity of the Old Spice campaign can be attributed to the fact the brand reiterated their message through a number of offline and online formats and especially on social media. This ensured that Old Spice’s content was in regular circulation throughout the internet. You could say their Old Spice social media campaign was a sweet success!

The integrated advertising agency, Widen and Kennedy created an advert for Old Spice to use during the 2010 Super Bowl. The hilarious video based ad, was entitled, The Man Your Man Could Smell Like and starred the former NFL professional athlete Isaiah Mustafa. The ad can still be viewed by clicking here.

How successful was the Old Spice Social Media campaign?

As a result of the Old Spice social media campaign the brand achieved the following statistics:

  • The Super Bowl advert became the most viewed sponsored video on YouTube.
  • The Super Bowl advert received over 236 million views.
  • In just two days Old Spice’s Twitter following increased by over 80,000.
  • Facebook interaction increased by 800% during the campaign. In addition, Old Spice’s Facebook following reached one and half million followers.
  • Old Spice reported increases of sales figures of over 107%.

When it comes to measuring the success of social media campaigns, it is not just a matter of generating interest and interaction on social media platforms. It is equally important to increase sales of products and services, the Old Spice social media campaign was successful as it managed to achieve both of these goals.

What lessons can be learnt from the Old Spice social media campaign?

1. Create videos which are concise and effective:

Many hold that online advertising videos should be no more than two minutes long. However Old Spice took brevity to a new level, many of their videos were less than a minute and some were as short as seventeen seconds.

2. Create content which is easily shareable:

The largest weakness with television based advertisements is often viewers have to wait to see it again. Launching adverts through online and offline avenues enables viewers to easily find and watch these videos again as they desire.

3. Use multiple platforms:

Old Spice ensured that their campaign would reach the largest number of people by making use of numerous platforms to display their content. To achieve this Old Spice made use of Twitter, Facebook and YouTube in order to bring their content directly to users.

4. Respond in real time to users:

Over a period of 24 hours Old Spice responded directly to tweets by creating over 116 authentic YouTube videos. One of which included a marriage proposal. In order to create these videos the Old Spice crew was given a total of seven minutes, this time included the writing process, the majority of these videos were the result of a single take. The key benefit of responding to user’s content in real time is that it increases the longevity of a social media campaign by continuing the conversation.

5. Make use of other people and their social media network:

As previously mentioned, the campaign responded to tweets with personalised YouTube videos. Old Spice used this method to respond to a tweet from “The Ellen Show”. The video, which can be viewed by clicking here, was then retweeted by The Ellen Show’s Twitter handles exposing it to the handle’s millions of followers. This technique enabled the Old Spice campaign to tap into an even greater audience, by meeting user’s desires who then spread this content throughout their network for free.

6. Introduce a negative spin:

The campaign’s creators added a of breath of life to the campaign by introducing a rival character called Fabio, “The New Old Spice Guy”. His introduction video can be viewed by clicking here. Viewers were then asked to vote on which Old Spice Guy they preferred, the new Fabio or the old Isaiah. This created a whole new wave of interaction with the campaign as users proclaimed their dislike for Fabio and preference for Isaiah who won the competition.