Google has released the leaderboard of the ten ads that were the most popular among Kiwi viewers over the course of 2014. And this list, which is determined through an algorithm that factors in paid views, organic views and view rate (how much of a video people chose to watch), provides an interesting glimpse at some of the key viewing trends in the online space over the past year.
Browsing: YouTube
Facebook and YouTube have released respective top ten lists of topics and content that proved most popular over the course of 2014. And to accompany the publication of these summaries of virality, the new media juggernauts have also launched a pair of retrospective videos that give viewers a glimpse at what got the masses clicking over the course of the last year.
Our weekly wrap of good things, strange things, funny things and other things from inside the intertubes.
If you don’t like Iggy Azalea, Lil John or Maroon 5 but love a good mashup, we have got just the thing.
Spotify recently admitted that YouTube is the world’s biggest music streaming service. And many of the most popular music videos can be found on the Vevo channel. So, as is the custom at this time of year, it’s crunched its annual numbers and released a top ten list of the most-watched music videos across Australia and New Zealand in 2014.
In November, Jamie Curry orchestrated a treasure hunt in Sydney as part of the #colouryoursummer campaign, which Coca-Cola has launched in an effort to get millennials thirsty over the warmer months. And this campaign has now also spread across to this side of the ditch, with the launch of the Kiwi version. And in continuing the trend of collaborating with YouTube personalties, Coca-Cola Oceania has announced that two up-and-coming Kiwi vloggers will also create videos for the local campaign.
How does one make a IT storage hardware solutions and cloud computing company look cool? How about sponsoring a giant truck to jump a speeding Formula 1 car, setting a world record in the process?
In both surfing and skateboarding culture, a harmonic groan often accompanies a wipeout. Whether it’s a group of pros waiting in the channel at Teahupo’o or a few mates just having a bowl session at the local skate park, this groan serves as a salute to the fallen. And the more severe the wipeout, the more animated and pronounced the reaction from the specators on the sideline.
It’s not often, especially not in the digital age, for a trailer to accompany the publication of book. However, for the release of ‘Surviving Middle School,’ a tongue-in-cheek guide for young girls, writer David McGrail has gone all out by commissioning the production of a three-minute clip, which gives a hyperbolic glimpse at what happens when school girls make the wrong choices.
With a total of 1.2 million subscribers across the world, the Kiwi vlogger Jamie Curry (of Jamie’s World) is one of only two New Zealanders to meet the YouTube star threshold of having more than a million subscribers. And her resonance with 13- to 24-year-olds recently caught the attention of Coca-Cola Australia, leading the drinks company to collaborate with the teen on the ‘Colour your summer’ campaign.
The bar for long-form advertising on YouTube has been raised by the ambitious projects several major brands over the last few years. Guinness, Chipotle, Johnnie Walker and Chanel No 5 have all commissioned the development of creative projects that seemingly conflate the disparate worlds of advertising and entertainment. And recently, when Honda released a series of teasers for its upcoming campaign, it seemed as though the online community would be treated to another online advert posing as a short story. But, what we got was something quite different.
YouTube is continuing to push the massive appeal of its online personalities and the possibilities that exist for advertisers to get involved with them as part of its Google Preferred plan. Last year, it took to TV in the US to promote the channel with ads featuring Michelle Phan, Bethany Mota and Rosanna Pansino and it followed that up with ads starring Epic Rap Battles of History and Vice News. Now it’s employed the services of The Slow Mo Guys, who have 4.5 million subscribers and have clocked more than 438 million views of their videos to date.
A number of premium brands are starting to take advantage of longer-form benefits of using YouTube as an advertising channel as recently seen with Guinness’ ‘Sapeurs’ mini-documentary, Corona’s short surf films and Johnnie Walker’s ‘The Gentleman’s Wager’. As illustrated in each of these videos, brand dollars can translate into high production videos, which are entertaining despite falling into the advertising category. Having seen its branding counterparts enjoy success on YouTube through longer form content, Chanel No 5 has recently commissioned Baz Luhrmann to direct a short film, and the result steps very close to the line of utter madness.
On 15 October, StopPress attended Google’s Brandcast event in Sydney, and the general theme delivered over the course of the 90-minute show was that YouTube stars provide an effective means by which brands can communicate with various target market. Here’s what some of the speakers had to say at the event.
Our weekly wrap of good things, strange things, funny things and other things from inside the intertubes.
It’s no secret that football has become a massive business enterprise, which relies on the appeal of handsomely paid sports stars to drive revenue. And while Cristano Ronaldo’s abs and Neymar’s consistently changing hairdos are successful at attracting interest from fans, Italian playmaker Andrea Pirlo has something that no other player has: a sullen face that seems incapable of being pleased. And in a move that shows it’s possible to even capitalise on things conventionally considered undesirable, Pirlo’s Turin-based club Juventus has now launched a campaign that encourages viewers to send in videos that might be able to impress the player.
Canada-based Milk West, a dairy partnership consisting of Alberta Milk, BC Dairy Association, Dairy Farmers of Manitoba and SaskMilk, has launched a somewhat bizarre YouTube-based campaign via DDB. Called Snack Time and featuring a trio traditional snacks in awkward scenes, the campaign takes the form of a web series that is intermittently updated with new videos.
Contiki is back with its YouTube vlogger roadtrip for the third year running, once again piggybacking on the millions of pairs of eyeballs already following every single step those vloggers take. This year New Zealand might be captive too, with Kiwi star Shannon Harris onboard as the only person from outside North America. Sales director Tony Laskey believes The Roadtrip is potentially one of the most powerful marketing strategies Contiki has ever used.
Over the last few months, Auckland Zoo has been putting its colourful and varied range of tenants to work by having them feature in a series of YouTube videos designed to draw attention to the attraction in the Super City. Rainger & Rolfe, the agency behind the on-going digital campaign, has held the Auckland Zoo account since 2011 (the account was originally held by Rolfe Limited and then moved across after the merger with Rainger Connect).
Colenso BBDO and Burger King are continuing their somewhat outrageous creative partnership with the introduction of Frank, a cockney geezer with a seeming inexhaustible resource of vernacular-laden phrases that even Guy Ritchie would battle to understand.
Although most marketers overlooked the significance of Earth Day from a commercial perspective, Work Communications took it as an opportunity to bring attention to the Earthcare’s point of difference in the market – namely, that all products in its tissue range are made from recycled paper.
Two years after first launching its ‘purer invironment’ spot, HRV has once again collaborated with Y&R NZ to launch an extension of the campaign, which will see the home improvement company take on an old, damp and mouldy home. The HRV Pure Invironment Project, which aims to show that it’s possible for any home—irrespective of its age—to have an invironment as comfortable as the one depicted in the original TVC, will result in the renovation of a 110-year-old villa over the next month.
Our weekly wrap of good things, strange things, funny things and other things from inside the intertubes.
Recruiting YouTube stars seems a weird thing for a tax management company to do, but that’s the idea behind H&R Block’s campaign that tries to tell ordinary citizens not to attempt their own tax return. Then again, they would say that.
Facebook is dominating Kiwi social media use, not just in the number of New Zealanders using the network, but also in the amount of time spent dwelling on the activity. The social network’s local dwell time far outpaces the next best performing channel here, Reddit.
The Tui campaign that began with a video prank and ended with a stack of YouTube views and media coverage around the globe has won this year’s Grand Prix prize in the Yahoo! Digital Strategy Awards. The campaign’s authentic content resonated with the target demographic, Yahoo! awards organisers said.
A US law firm has got creative with two of life’s not-so-good things: divorce and non-existent YouTube videos. And the videos wouldn’t be complete without a hint of celebrity.
Westpac has had nearly 30,000 YouTube views of a promotional clip for its UK Global App challenge, which calls on British geeks to test their adventurous mettle downunder.
A six-minute summary of all the viral madness that pervaded 2013. If ever there was a reason to fear for the future of humanity, this might be it.
Kiwi online hardware store Trade Tested has taken to YouTube with its own version of the cheesy informercial genre. A woodchipper at the company’s warehouse near Auckland International Airport is one of the stars of the videos, modelled on infomercials like the US series Will It Blend, by blender firm Blendtec.