Just watch the film

Taking its tagline ‘Red Bull gives you wings’ to the (il)logical extreme, the energy drink manufacturer is funding an out-of-this-world extreme skydive and streaming online an attempt to break the speed of sound by freefall.

The Red Bull Stratos mission will see skydiver Felix Baumgartner rising to an incredible 120,000 feet (approx 23 miles) above the Earth in a stratospheric balloon. Once on the edge of space, Baumgartner will freefall back to land and attempt to break the speed of sound as he does so – a feat never before accomplished – and then turn his supersonic attempt into a parachute jump.

Red Bull Media House partnered with YouTube to live-stream the event, allowing people to view Baumgartner’s descent either on the Stratos mission website, YouTube or the Red Bull Facebook page. In order to create this high-altitude coverage, the brand also collaborated with Riedel Communications, FlightLine Films and 3G Communications, to build a flying production studio complete with over 35 moving and still image cameras, two ground-based optical tracking systems, and three POV cameras on Baumgartner’s body.

Over on the Stratos Mission website, Red Bull has provided a wealth of information about the science, the tech and the team behind the jump.

Contagious Insight /

The advent of branded content has sadly resulted in many brands creating sub-standard, TV-like content – effectively little more than grossly extended TV ads. This misses a huge opportunity to connect with audiences that might be underserved by traditional entertainment offerings. The fact that entertainment is the most funded category on Kickstarter would demonstrate that neither broadcasters nor brands have managed to find these audiences nor, in the case of brands, resist their natural urges to make overly-long online commercials.

In contrast, the Stratos mission is set to provide genuinely thrilling online content that will not only attract an audience but also inevitably garner plenty of earned media in the process (a man falling from space at supersonic speeds is a shoo-in for a slot on any news show). Beyond the fall itself, Red Bull has also provided a wealth of supporting content and info for those people wishing to get more deeply involved with the project.

Earlier this year, Google’s VP of TV and Entertainment Robert Kyncl outlined where he thought the future of online content was heading, saying ‘People went from broad to narrow [in terms of the type of content they watch], and we think they will continue to go that way – spend more and more time in the niches.’

The advice is therefore reasonably clear – make content people want to watch and can’t find anywhere else, or prepare to be ignored.

www.redbullstratos.com

Un Viral muy divertivo,

Fortiplus commercial from totalissimo on Vimeo.

Amnistía Internacional llevó a dos de sus clientes para comprar armas, una a una fábrica en Bélgica y uno en Francia. Todo estaba bien. Ellos entran por la puerta de entrada, como si estuvieran comprando una ensaimada en la panadería. Sin embargo, para descubrir quiénes fueron los compradores. Frente al Tratado Global sobre el Comercio de Armas, que Amnistía Internacional pide a esta iniciativa. no te pierdas el video.

Ya se estan convirtiendo en clásicos, pero nunca me canso de ver este tipo de acciones esta en concreto me encanta. Un examen de conducir donde las reglas han cambiado y tienes que envíar SMS mientras realizas el examen.

Holanda.- La manufacturera de automóviles surcoreana Hyundai ha recurrido a la hipnosis para su nueva campaña de marketing interactivo.

Con la colaboración del hipnotista británico Peter Powers lanzó un video de 17 minutos llamado Online Hypnosis Experiment, que reta a las personas a vivir una experiencia real de hipnotismo a través de sus computadoras.

Para el lanzamiento del nuevo modelo Hyundai i30, la celebridad de televisión e hipnotista Peter Powers ofrece a los internautas participar en un experimento de hipnosis online.

A través de un microsite, la marca hace una extensa advertencia al público a no participar bajo ciertas condiciones y recalca que quien se atreva a realizar el experimento lo hace bajo su propia responsabilidad.

El video de 17 minutos promete hacer que las personas experimenten el auto de una forma totalmente nueva, bajo los efectos de la hipnosis.

La campaña se integra también de un video promocional en YouTube donde se muestra a tres mujeres que son hipnotizadas por Powers. La campaña fue desarrollada por la agencia Fitzroy.

1. Playstation Projection Mapping

I came across this on the Digital Buzz Blog. It’s projection mapping with a nice twist. Instead of being emblazoned across some big building this is done within a confined space, it’s very clever and all done in one take.

2. The Ikea Apartment

Underground/metro/train stations are all the rage for pulling off stunts from flashmobs, to a virtual shopping store to a subway piano and even Ikea themselves are no strangers to using such locations. This time around they whacked it up a notch by building a fully functioning apartment using Ikea products – and even stuck a few real people in there. It’s a bit ‘big brother’ but with less annoying people, and there’s no toilet, but I don’t think Ikea make toilet bowls.

3. Ikea Sleepover

I’m sure you’ve heard of this – there was a Facebook Page called ‘I Wanna Have a Sleepover in Ikea‘ set up over two years ago. Ikea took inspiration from it and gave 100 of their Facebook Fans a chance to win a sleepover in Ikea Essex. It’s almost like crowd sourcing marketing ideas, which is exactly what social media is great for. But for all the great idea’s there’s countless others that are just not worth pursuing. The trick is to find and act upon the right ones.

4. Mini Fan The Flame

Car companies are pushing the boat out with social media, maybe seeing social media as a path to replicating the real world communities that built up around the Harley Davidson or Jeep brands. It’s lead to some interesting developments as you’ll see in the next few points.

This Facebook Campaign from Mini allows fans to win a Mini by liking its page. That sounds pretty dull so far but the Mini you could win is attached to a rope, you will be given a shot of fire to burn through that rope – if the rope breaks, the Mini is yours.

While I’m talking about Mini they did a great little Facebook game called Mini Maps last summer that seemed to have gone un-noticed by many. The game used Google maps to allow players race anywhere in the world. You could build tracks, race friends or even race strangers. The game is still available here.

5. Chevy Sonic Lets Do This

The Chevy Sonic brand are trying to entice consumers to do something new and fork out a fortune on buy a new Chevy Sonic. They’ve done a bunch of stunts so far – thrown one out of a plane, did a kickflip in one and made a music video with Ok Go. But the one that stands out for me is this one, where online clicks helped pushed a Chevy Sonic – attached to a bungee cord – closer to a 100 foot drop. After 2.5 million clicks the car was pushed over the edge. Admittedly I would’ve preferred this to hit the ground or blow up at the push of a click but the public vote/click angle is a very cool move.

6. Fashion Industry Exposed

Without giving too much away, this made me laugh.

7. Reebok Crossfit

This is the worlds largest, and longest, 3D street art created in London at the end of last year for Reebok. It may also give you vertigo.

8. Frog Marketing

Finally I thought this was sufficiently odd for inclusion. A French restaurant had difficulty in overcoming the perception of French cuisine in Russia. It was seen as over priced with small portions and involved frogs. Upon this premise bloggers, journalists, radio DJ’s and food critics were all sent a frog in a container, which caused a bit of a stir online and in the media. The frog could be exchanged for a free meal which earned the restaurant a load of publicity in return. The VO gets a bit OTT towards the end, claiming to have changed the perception of French food forever, but lets forgive it for that.

Experiential marketing is a powerful way to obtain customer engagement with brands.

The theory on experiential marketing will tell you that it integrates emotions, logic and general thought processes to connect with the consumers.

It usually appeals to a variety of senses and taps into that special place most human beings have, a deep down inside place that is closely related to thoughts about comfort and pleasure.  To do this effectively, marketers need to know what is in the minds of the target audience they want to attract.

The goal here is to entice the consumer into acting on that impulse to purchase and ultimately drive sales and increase brand image and awareness.

The following campaigns will at least demonstrate that emotional connection between brand and consumer is what is sought by the brand and that pleasure, although in a very different way… is present in all cases .

The first example is the Twisted Metal Playstation game.  This campaign created by the Deutsch Inc agency has to be applauded for its usage of Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and a dedicated website to promote this unusual gig, this is digital convergence at its best.

Twisted Metal - ShootMyTruck VIDEO

Twisted Metal - ShootMyTruck VIDEO

Try to put yourself in the shoes of the average hard core gamer who is usually between 16 and 25 and who is crazy about ‘’Shooter’’ games, you know, the ones that have all sort of guns and war scenarios and that you can play for hours on end.

Now imagine you are told that by registering via Facebook or Twitter, you can fire a real M249-SAW machine gun mounted on a control desk in the middle of the desert.  The gun happens to be aimed at a replica of the game’s hero van and other objects laying there on the desert… is this emotional enough?  Does it produce pleasure to the target audience?  I think so

A Small Job agency from Barcelona did something similar…well not with real bullets but with paintball balls and a paintball machine gun.

Trident's ''Dude where is my chicken'' reality show VIDEO

The  campaign was called Pointless fun and it was done  with JTW for Trident to promote  Senses Gum in Spain last summer.  The event’s main idea was to create a  reality TV show set on a chicken farm called ‘Dude, Where’s My Chicken?’ In order to get to fire the paintball gun onto a wall of t-shirts through your computer or mobile phone, the chicken you had previously selected  had to lay an egg.  In order to know if it had done so, you could follow your chicken through the different cameras that where set up around the farm, cool ideas that had people loggin on the website and participating most of the day.

The second example is the Coca-cola Happiness Machine for Couples.  Here is a perfect example of how to mix pleasure, emotions and brand.  The video does a great job at relaying that ‘’emotional connection’’.

The Coca Cola Happiness Machine for couples VIDEO

And last but not least we have the ‘’Budweiser Poolball Experiential Campaign that was created by Ogilvy Argentina.  Just imagine the emotional impact the idea of mixing soccer and nightlife can bring to certain…I was going to say men but there are certainly quite a few ladies out there that enjoy their soccer as much as men do

Budweiser "Poolball" VIDEO

What do you think about the ”Experiential Theory”?  Does it work for your brands?

Daniel Arenas Tello