FurnaceZilla Shakes Things Up
With the launch of HeatSource Mechanical's latest commercial, the first major viral ad campaign in Alaska is underway. The commercial features a 300-foot-tall forced-air furnace on a rampage through the city of Wasilla. The computer-generated monster was composited with live-action video shot on location by Stage 2 Studios.
In the first week of the campaign, traffic at HeatSourceAK.com increased 750%. Thanks to additional publicity from an Anchorage Daily News story, the month over month visits increased 1,000% from July to August.
Of course, web metrics are well and good, but we tell our customers the one stat that matters is their bottom line. In this case, the early signs are good. One new customer last week said he hadn't heard of HeatSource before but he was using them because they have the coolest ad on TV.
Stories like that one--and the buzz they represent--are the power behind so-called viral marketing. Some local companies spend tens of thousands of dollars a month on traditional TV advertisements. But how many local heating company ads do you remember? And how many would you tell a friend about?
The trick is to put your viewers to work as salespeople. The first iteration of the FurnaceZilla ad doesn't push the HeatSource name at all but simply ends with a web URL: FurnaceZilla.com. The plan was to create a commercial so exciting and mysterious that viewers would log on to the website, view a longer video, and send the link to their friends. And as the stats have shown, they have.
And that is the definition of a viral marketing campaign: potential customers so excited about your advertisement they share it with others. While not appropriate for every client in every situation, there is obviously enormous power in this approach to marketing. In fact, it's so obvious you don't even need a 300-foot-tall FurnaceZilla to see it.
In the first week of the campaign, traffic at HeatSourceAK.com increased 750%. Thanks to additional publicity from an Anchorage Daily News story, the month over month visits increased 1,000% from July to August.
Of course, web metrics are well and good, but we tell our customers the one stat that matters is their bottom line. In this case, the early signs are good. One new customer last week said he hadn't heard of HeatSource before but he was using them because they have the coolest ad on TV.
Stories like that one--and the buzz they represent--are the power behind so-called viral marketing. Some local companies spend tens of thousands of dollars a month on traditional TV advertisements. But how many local heating company ads do you remember? And how many would you tell a friend about?
The trick is to put your viewers to work as salespeople. The first iteration of the FurnaceZilla ad doesn't push the HeatSource name at all but simply ends with a web URL: FurnaceZilla.com. The plan was to create a commercial so exciting and mysterious that viewers would log on to the website, view a longer video, and send the link to their friends. And as the stats have shown, they have.
And that is the definition of a viral marketing campaign: potential customers so excited about your advertisement they share it with others. While not appropriate for every client in every situation, there is obviously enormous power in this approach to marketing. In fact, it's so obvious you don't even need a 300-foot-tall FurnaceZilla to see it.
posted by D. Board at
3:50 PM
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