Swisscom has shot straight to the top of the Viral Brand Chart this week with a fun competition offering commuters at a Zurich train station the chance to win a free Samsung Galaxy S4 phone.
The challenge - simply stare at a digital picture of the handset for 1 hour without looking away (blinking was allowed), sound easy? Well it might be, if there weren’t motorbikes, sniffer dogs, fires and a whole host of other things trying to distract you!
The campaign, by ad agency Heimat, showcased the Galaxy S4’s inbuilt Smart Pause function, which meant if a participant’s eyes strayed for just a millisecond, the buzzer went off and the challenge was failed.
It’s a pretty simple concept, but experiential marketing campaigns have seen a massive rise in popularity recently and the mobile phone network is the latest in a long line of brands to cash in on the marketing trend, clocking up nearly 3.5 million views and over 50 thousand Facebook and Twitter shares.
Also trending this week, Coca-Cola continues its mission to single handedly spread ‘friendship and sharing’ across the world with the new Sharing Can, which, as the name suggests, can be split into two halves, perfect for sharing with a friend.The campaign follows on from the release last month of Coke bottles with personalised name labels, (a pretty genius idea IMO - who can resist the egotistical draw of something that looks like it was made especially for you. I’ve lost track of the amount of friends sharing photos of coke bottles with their name on them in my newsfeeds recently). The concept of spreading happiness has certainly become an integral part of the Coca-Cola advertising strategy, and it looks like an angle the brand is sticking with it!
Elsewhere in the Brand chart, Heineken continues its hidden camera social experiments, this time round, drinkers in Mexico City were approached by a mysterious woman with 2 tickets to watch the Champions League Final. So what's the catch? Well, it’s in London, they need to be at the airport in 2 hours and of course Heineken aren’t going to make the journey to get there easy. Moving across to the UGC chart and top of the listings is one of my favourite videos this week – an adorable little animal lover called Luiz, who’s single-handedly fighting the cause for vegetarianism with a charming explanation about why he doesn’t want to eat his squid dinner… “So when we eat animals they die? I don’t like that they die, I like that they stay standing up.” The original version of this video was on well over 4 million views but since it’s now been removed, here’s a link to an alternative upload.
