Youtube content of the Week/29.08.08

1) The COI have come up with some crackers (from FARM and th1ng) to get young British people into learning a new language. These ads show case some great French Hip Hop. At last someone has used urban culture in a non cheesy, non commerical, non "we get hip hop and urban culture, no really we do" way. Plus I love french rhyme - there isn't enough of it in the UK....which is another point - the COI seem fresh because they are introducing a new strand to UK Urban music consumption. I wonder how many people in the UK currently listen to it.... :




2) A Great viral from Samsung, I would def pass this on, it's witty and clever, but most of all a fantastic use of CGI (I think?). Samsung has used an insight about the type of videos that are posted on youtube and turned it on its head - tres bon



3) EA games recently posted a youtube video response to a guy that had taken the piss out of a flaw in the Tiger Woods computer game on the site. This shows how 'on the button' the EA brand is, it shows it understands its customer, and it shows that the brand believes in itself. You can't help but feel big respect for this youtube video:



Fresh and Clean

What have a trainer, a burger and Kanye West got in common???

…Well.... a trainer, a burger and Kanye West lead me on a blog hunt to the SICKEST new album in the past year!! OMG anyone that hasn’t come across A Trak’s ‘debut’ album, ‘Running man’.… COME ACROSS HIM – it is AAAAAmazing. …The worst thing about it is that I can’t download it yet because it’s only in the States and I don’t do that illegal shiz.

Let’s back track….

I came across the track because I was on Kanye’s blog who was mentioning a famous artist who has made a Nike trainer out of a burger. This ‘trainerburger’ ( a very beefy Air Max 90) was first mentioned on ‘Fools Gold’, A trak’s blog. I followed the blog to A trak’s Myspace page, which is PR-ing his fantastic new album which has been produced in partnership with Nike + and is the most recent album addition to the Nike + playlist available on itunes.

So the planner point? Nike has mastered internet PR in a BIG way.

Serendipity (me tripping over things online) meant that the Nike brand received a hit every step of my internet path from Kanye’s blog, to A trak’s blog, to Myspace, to itunes. 4 hits in 4 minutes. And the reason?

• Nike commissioned Olle Hemmendorff, a Swedish illustrator to interpret a piece of iconic Nike clothing (PR drive no.1)
• Nike asked A trak to produce an album for Nike + (Pr drive no.2)
• A Trak wrote about Olle Hemmendorff on his blog (Pr drive (being endorsement) no.3) (A-Trak is signed to Kanye West’s record label)
• Kanye wrote about the trainers on his blog (Pr drive (being endorsement) no.4)
• A Trak has got all his web touch points covered – myspace, facebook, blog, itunes etc)
• People like me give him and Nike et al a shout out. (Citizen PR – luck drive no. 5)

And you know who also benefits??? Sony benefits. A trak has produced a song using a sample from Jose Gonzales which features in their first Bravia (Balls) ad. The track is called “Get em high remix” – check it out on A Trak's page

And hence my theory is proved: that the best way to get share of voice in 2008 is through PR worthy partnerships, with other PR worthy brands (including people). That’s because 2 amazing things is better than 1 amazing thing – and when a multimillion brand partners with a multi million selling artist and then commissions another successful artist etc... we see a lot of buzz and a lot of love…

Wooo I know, you can measure how much Buzz there is about a brand here, try it for Nike..

Ps... A Trak also won the DMC World DJ championships in 1997 (I read that here)

Hear Busta Rhyme by doing time…

Subsequent to my last post I have found an amazing union of charity and entertainment that totally blows any other charity partnerships out the water!! BOOM! Orange are sponsoring RockCorps – an entertainment company that has good will at its heart. RockCorps put on big fat music concerts, with big phat music stars (Busta and Dizzy are head-lining the first UK one) … However instead of charging an extraordinary amount for tickets, their target market have to volunteer for 4 hours to EARN their ticket. This is triple excellence: (1) The target audience teenagers learn more about those around them by volunteering (2) Loads of people benefit from volunteer work (3) The system is totally democratic – you can go to the concert whether you have no money to your name, or all the money in the world, as longs as you ‘sing for your supper’.

The project has been hugely successful in the US and now Orange have bought it to the UK (also in partnership with Ch 4, Community Service Volunteers-one of the UK’s largest volunteer and training organisations and XFM). This event is being held at the Royal Albert Hall….I reckon the next event should be held at The O2, so that Orange and O2 can get into some form of bidding war over who can give the most to charity and thus solve world poverty…..here’s hoping anyway.

I first read about this here

(Painting above is by me)