Talking Furniture Insures Ad Industry's Survival

Comments

lol. THIS is how you rock a furniture contest: http://memelabs.com/galleryfurniture/

It was totally regional (Houston area only) and had tons of people going mental over winning. Radio personalities got involved, there was controversy in a public school district, etc.

If you are going to do just one thing for an online video contest it should be to generate a ton of offline buzz. its critical.

When will it ever stop?! I actually called someone I know who sells UGC technology to brands to understand how she could sell something so feeble and ineffective:

http://dailybiz.wordpress.com/2008/05/08/more-video-uploading-madness/

The article Daily Biz spammed is pretty good. You know that a fad is in the decline when no name companies start doing lame version of it. Not to be critical, but the sample video on the ForRent.com site made me vomit in my mouth a little. Luckily it seems that there are only eight entries. In this instance, anyone who took the time, would have a 1/9 shot of winning.

Hey I just checked out the If Only Your Apartment Furniture Could Talk video contest at www.WinApartmentFurniture.com. There are actually some pretty funny videos on there. I was surprised. I'd probably check back at a laster date to see if any new cool ones come in.

I do like how there are clickable watermarks in the video player. I have yet to see that technology. I wish YouTube would allow customizable watermarks so that I can link my videos to my MySpace profile.

Nice plug, Adidasgill:-)

This UGC stuff has become de rigueur. I can't remember the last marketing campaign press release or news item that didn't include some sort of "submit your [whatever]" as one of several campaign elements.

I hear the following tip has moved up to #1 in the CMO Handbook:

"At the end of the agency presentation, lean very slowly forward, clench both hands together and place them on the conference table, and say - 'Not bad. But I didn't hear or see anything about a consumer-generated content promotion to go with it.' Then sit back very cooly and confidently, as if you have just farted a little with no one knowing it."

What bothers me about UGC are the companies who use it because they are too lazy to come up with their own concept. At first doing UGC was new and shiney and now it's old- I want to see real creative coming from real talent.

This ForRent site is using the UGC as contest entries which I'm cool with and it's probably a smart move since everyone thinks they're a designer/ writer/ director nowadays. I dig the crying chair.