Entertaining, Interactive, Advertisements; Thoughts on Forbe's "The Best-Ever Social Media Campaigns" Comm. 406

      Many people are using new online technologies like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and other social networking sites, to connect and socialize on the web. People who are employed in advertising are taking advantage of these popular resources to make advertising a part of our cyberculture. Many advertising campaign's ads aren't just appearing on the side of your computer screen as passive persuasive images; they are becoming more involved in these social avenues. The recent article on Forbes.com entitled, "The Best-Ever Social Media Campaigns," explains that advertising corporations are becoming increasingly interactive to get the potential consumer involed via the internet. According to the article, it is the advertising company's goal to include interactive videos, gimmicks, games, etc. to social mediums on the internet, like Twitter, to make people interested in their product or idea and to further make those people share the ad(s) with thier network of friends. A panel of expert judges from social marketing agencies ranked twenty of the best-ever social media campaigns that included this interactivness.   


  Going viral has been a pretty brilliant strategy for various ad campaigns. For example, the article discusses the ever so popular commercials for Proctor and Gamble's Old Spice products that came in as number three on the best-ever social media campaigns list. Not only did the company have hilarious TV advertisements, but the actor in them,  Issiah Mustafa, answered questions of viewers on Web Videos, giving people who paid attention to the campaign recognition, as well as, giving loads of attention to Old Spice. I am a fan of Old Spice commercials because they are so entertaining and humorous. I am not a man, and would never in my life use Old Spice body wash or deodorent, but I do love a good laugh. The people behind this campaign are creative comedic geniuses. The actor gained enough popularity to appear on heavily watched talk shows like Ellen. Here Issiah Mustafa chats with Ellen Degeneres giving the inside scoop about the famous, hilarious commericial that made him shine!

      
Some other advertising campaigns that made it on the top charts, and that I'm a personal subscriber and viewer of, is Blendtec's "Will It Blend?" Blentec is a powerful professional blender that can supposedly blend everything from glow sticks to iPads.Tom Dickson is the founder of Blendtec and "destroyer" of objects.I can see why this campaign is so popular. He downloads his videos on YouTube, which anyone can join or not join to view his cutting edge videos!


What this article stressed the most was why these viral ad campaigns became so well recognized by the masses. They all have convincing and intriguing elements that appeal to many people, like humor, creativity, and shock value.  People, like me, view these ads and can't help but share their intrigue and humor with friends and family, thus making them go viral.