Cameron Olthuis

Burger King loves their viral marketing, they just can’t get enough. Today I came across a new site that BK put up where a puppet king dances to different musical beats. You can then email the videos to your friends. These videos are pretty fun and I can see them really being a hit.

I first wrote about BK a few weeks ago when they launched the Huckin’ Chicken web site, it features videos of the chicken mascot performing stunts on a dirt bike, better videos unlock after a certain number of page views. This isn’t the first experience BK’s had with viral marketing either, there’s also the infamous Subservient Chicken site.

Burger King is doing a great job with viral marketing. These sites are also great examples of what we call “linkbait” in the SEO industry. That basically means these type of sites bait people into linking to them. I guess the question is how many more customers is this bringing in?

The NHL is gearing up to launch a social network in time for the 06/07 hockey season. The network, dubbed NHL Connect, is currently in private beta and can be viewed here.

Pete Cashmore (Mashable*) has the scoop…

users can create profiles, add friends, upload photos, insert YouTube videos, add comments, join groups and subscribe to new content via RSS. There are also some hockey-specific features: the latest NHL news, lists of scheduled games and the ability to find users based on their favorite teams and players.

I’m a hockey nut and I was delighted to wake up this morning and read about this. I can hardly wait for it to become public.

Social networking is a natural step for the sports community and I’ll be watching for the NFL, NBA, and MLB to follow suit. Fans are passionate and these leagues already have huge community followings which will make adoption of these services pretty easy. It will be especially nice for people like myself who live 1000+ miles away from any serious hockey civilization. Now we can connect with other fans to share a common interest. Kudos to the NHL for recognizing this huge opportunity and going for it. Go Flames in 06/07!

I think TheWeblogWire, which launched today, is a brilliant idea. Mashable broke the news….

The idea itself is interesting: The Weblog Wire allows companies to submit press releases, and bloggers to subscribe to these releases via RSS. Submitting a press release costs $99, or $149.99 if you want The Weblog Wire to write it for you.

Two reasons why I think this idea is a good one..

1) Bloggers want to break the news as quickly as possible, they will signup to receive the feeds.

2) Marketers want bloggers blogging about their product, services, etc.

TheWeblogWire’s success will be dependent on their own marketing strategy, unfortunately getting a little buzz from some blogs won’t be enough for them. It’s just not the right channel to reach the people submitting through other news wires, such as PRWeb. I’m excited to see what else, if anything, they have up their sleeves for marketing as I would really like to see them gain traction.

Coke, who orginally didn’t want the free advertising from the Diet Coke/Mentos videos is now copying Mentos, who has been “tickled pink” from the beginning.

Mentos, who quite obviously understands and loves viral marketing, announced their Mentos Gyser Video Contest the other day. Now Coke is doing the exact same thing. **yawn*

Mentos is setting a great example by embracing the new mediums and executing quickly. Coke is doing a great job of showing that they’re unoriginal and will only come around after they’ve been smacked around a little, I guess that’s better than Paramount who responds with their attack dog lawyers.

Update: Logic + Emotion has a good take on the story.

It’s amazing how dumb the decisions that some companies make can be. Paramount briefly shut down the blog of a fan who’s been a huge evangelist for the upcoming “Transformers” movie. The Church of the Customer Blog has the scoop…

Last week, the studio asked John Campea, co-author of The Movie Blog, to remove a photo he posted from the forthcoming movie “Transformers.” He complied, only to find yesterday that Paramount had dispatched its attack dogs, a DMCA shiv firmly clenched between their broken, smoke-stained teeth, to take down John’s entire site. (This free-speech/fair comment assault weapon is used quite frequently.) They didn’t like another image on the site, but Paramount neglected to tell John about it…

…Now John is pissed, his readers are pissed, and Digg’ers are pissed. Boycotts of the movie, Paramount DVDs and theme parks are being discussed. Probably won’t be long before the word of mouth jetstream propels this story to new heights.

Paramount obviously doesn’t get it. Why on earth they would do this to such a loyal evangelist (or anyone for that matter) is beyond me. Instead of embracing marketing 2.0 they are squashing it. If I was in Paramount’s shoes I would’ve been feeding John as much content as possible.

This is sure to be a great example of how buzz can work against you if you don’t embrace it.