Traction Marketing Group

There's all kinds of interesting, funny and amazing videos floating around online.  Being pushed through blogs, video sites and inboxes propels the life of viral videos across the nation and world in minutes.  Given 6 months or more can grab millions upon millions of eyes on engaging content, entertaining and informing viewers.

Most viral videos are just what they are... videos, shot by amateurs, crudely edited and/or compressed into streaming online content.  TV commercials can go viral, but they've got to be even more engaging to catch on or they'll flop - making viewers feel like they're being advertised to (imagine that).  People eating up online video content don't seem to like being spoon fed blatant ads, or even general branding techniques.  An obvious logo in the wrong place can actually inspire negative impressions, especially with younger generations who practically live online and consume more rich media than their older counterparts.

Enter Video View Optimization.  Cleverly hinting at brands and concepts mixed with a little in-video product placement within engaging, amateurish productions makes for a video worth pushing viral. 

I'd like to present you with my favorite example of this.  I personally watched this video twice, just enjoying the tricks.  Watching it a third time (months later) I started wondering if it was cleverly concealed advertising.  The premise of the video is based on how this goofy, yet charismatic guy can throw sunglasses around and they happen to land on his buddy's face.  But wait, it's not hard for most people to recognize this particular pair of shades - classic Ray-Bans! There's really no way of telling whether this is in fact a video produced by Ray-Ban or not, until the last few seconds of the video.  Check out what's written in the dirt on the back window of the car!  It's not obvious as to what it means or why it's there.  But a young, curious potential customer of the retro-styled sunglasses will probably want to figure this out.  They're probably going to do one of two things.  One, Google the catch phrase to see if it brings forth related results, or two, type it right in to the address bar of their already-opened browser, add a ".com" and see what happens.

Either of these bring you to Ray-Ban's official website.  Both are trackable and leave the visitor impressed with the interactive adventure this little video took them on.  It's a good look at where advertising is heading and what we ad agencies are going to be doing on local levels... and soon! 

The video is below, embedded and streaming from YouTube.  Go ahead... add to their viral success and check it out!  It really is worth watching.  I figure it's the worst looking, high budget special effects you've ever seen; purposely degraded to further hide the marketing genius from it's prey.  Embed it and share it as you like!