Viral Marketing for Page Views
Last night I posted on page views as a business model and why I think it will work this time around. This morning I stumbled across a new twist on page views.
The Huckin’ Chicken is a viral marketing site setup by Burger King. The site features the Burger King chicken mascot performing stunts on a dirt bike. Here’s the twist, the videos are locked for viewing and as the site gets more visitors then videos are unlocked, and the stunts keep getting better and better.
This is a very clever take on marketing 2.0 to encourage page views. However, the Huckin’ Chicken is missing a few key elements. For example, they should have an RSS feed to notify us when new videos are viewable. This would encourage more return visits that they will otherwise be missing out on.
Will we continue see more stuff like this? Absolutely, I think it’s a fantastic idea and we will definitely continue to see more viral videos like this. It’s an extremely inexpensive form of branding. However, these marketing techniques won’t work if they’re directly tied to ad revenue, you can’t just slap something like this up with some ads and expect it to work. Those that try will fail miserably.
Cameron Olthuis is the Founder of
[…] I was just reading that they thought it would be clever to put a bunch of videos of some jerk in a chicken suit doing tricks on a dirt bike on their website. Um, this is supposed to make me want to go to Burger King and buy my dinner? Do these idiots really think that I want to be associated with such a retarded marketing campaign, clearly aimed at 9-year old boys? […]
The videos being locked and released based on views is a nice touch… however do they expect the average user to try to promote the site only to see more videos? BK has a good idea… but I doubt your average joe would really go that far to just see a chicken on a bike.
Eric, I hear you. However, when I posted this just a few days they only had like 20,000 visits, it’s now up to about 300,000, not bad for less than a week. The bigger question is how many of these people are actually going to rush and buy a chicken sandwich from BK?
Hi,
I find viral marketing another fascinating example of a way that the internet is allowing the public to force the content providers to improve their services.
In the early days of broadcasting/newspapers, you got what you were given and watched/listened/read it or went without. Advertisers paid big bucks because they new people would be forced to see there adverts through lack of other options.
Now with podcasts and blogs etc if you don’t like what you are listening to, you just find somewhere else. This means that if I am a fantatic journalist with integrity for the writing accurate facts and literary competence. My (for example) sports news blog has the potential to become popular. Suddenly, through the like of adsense ect, I can be earning advertising revenue taking a slice of the pie that feeds ad laden websites like sky sports, causing them to having to rethink their strategy.
Now clearly with budget way in excess of your amateur enthusiast, they have the power to adapt and potentially take back those waning audiences, which although possibly bad news for the amateur blogger mean overall the public gets better services.
Which brings me to viral marketing. Sites are having to think of ways to intice readers back with encentives for decent content, whatever it may be. The days of “If you build it, they will come” are over.
Mark, very good points. I agree with you. What’s the link to your sports news blog?
Sadly, the sports news blog mention was just an example. I restrict myself to adding my tuppence worth in the comments sections of others’ blogs. However my point about the sky sports website was valid. I have never seen a site with such a high advert/content ratio. Those flash adverts that jump out move about the screen foring you to try and spot the close button before it moves infuriate me. Did anyone ever see one and think “hmm…I did want to read about X but I’ll quickly just sit through 30 seconds of volvo advert driving around the screen absuring the text”. Sorry I’ve gone off on a tangent. Perhaps I should start my own blog. :o)
Mark, yes you should definitely start your own blog, you have a good writing style and it’s quite obvious you have a strong opinion (a good thing). I hear you loud and clear about those ads, I think we all find them annoying. I have yet to hear from one person who actually likes them.