Yo, Beardy’s heading on vacation this week so VCN’s going to be quiet for a little while. We should be getting back to complaining about stuff sometime around July 1. Peace out, nerds.
Archive for June, 2010
3rd Place Godaddy video created by NY Ad Agency
Posted by Dan L. on June 15th, 2010
A VCN reader sent me a link yesterday to a really eye-opening Adage.com article about the big “user-generated” Godaddy video contest. Turns out that the commercial that came in third was created by a NYC based ad firm called The Night Agency. Their entry was entitled “Get Online Rap” and for winning third place they won $25,000. What’s weird about that ad is that it looks like a very slick version of a typical video contest entry. Were the people behind it actually trying to imitate the “user-generated” style we’ve all started to become familiar with? Back when I thought this ad was just made by some random guy, I liked it. But the fact that an entire team of professionals was behind this commercial is a real turn off. I mean, seriously…a cheesy rap song? That’s the best a hip, New York ad firm could come up with?
From their website, The Night Agency looks to be a pretty serious company and clients include MTV, Hanes, Kmart, Heineken, Macys, Yahoo and many, many more. They certainly don’t seem to be hurting for business. In fact, one of the creators of the ad makes it sound like they just plan to throw their $25K in winnings on to their ever-growing pile of money:
Our third-place finish netted us $25,000 that we’re happy to deposit in the agency bank account.
That bothers me. In fact, this whole thing bothers me. Is it cheating for a professional ad firm to use their money and resources to try and win a “user-generated” ad contest? Not really. Is it kind of a dick move? Yes…yes it is. From where I’m sitting, it feels a little unethical for professionals to enter video contests because it goes against the spirit of these competitions. These contests aren’t just about winning money; it’s about giving non-pros a shot at success. Sure, the sponsor is looking for quality videos and commercials but if all they cared about was getting good content they’d skip the contest all together and just hire a firm like the Night Agency to shoot them a commercial. The point of the contest is to award filmmakers money and OPPORTUNITY. And the prize of opportunity is wasted on companies that are already successful. Winning third place (and even winning 1st place) probably won’t change the lives of anyone at The Night Agency and I doubt it will get them any extra business. In fact, I imagine they won’t even show their Godaddy ad to potential clients since entering a video contest might come off as a little desperate.
So why did the Night Agency decide to try and compete with amateur filmmakers in the godaddy contest? Well, apparently, they did it as an experiment. The company has actually created and run several “user-generated campaigns” for various clients so they wanted to see what the experience was like from the “user” side of the campaign. Now, I respect their dedication to their work but if they were really doing this as an “experiment” they should have tried to create a real “user-generated” (i.e. amateur) video. But instead of trying to replicate the typical video contest experience, they made a professional version of an amateur commercial. The rapper in “Get Online Rap” is a well-known professional eater (for serious) named Badlands Booker. He’s not an A-lister but would 95% of the people that entered the godaddy contest be able to hire any “known” personality for a project that might not even pay off? Of course not. So even though “Get Online Rap” looked and felt like a “user-generated” ad I’m guessing it was probably one of the most expensive entries shot for the godaddy contest.
If the folks at The Night Agency had been serious about their “experiment” they should have had the nerve to try and replicate he entire video contest experience. By that I mean they should have put a cap of maybe $500 (and that’s being generous) on what they could spend and only use gear and talent available to low-budget filmmakers. If they had done that though, they wouldn’t have won even third place. Without professional production values, “Get online rap” would have just been another hacky rap entry.
The Adage article I’ve been mentioning is really, really worth reading. It will give you an insider’s view of user-generated contests and the author lists reasons why the Godaddy contest was so successful. Most interestingly though, the article ends with a word of warning to other professional marketing types that the “crowd” is coming and soon, the pros are going to have to start competing with them:
So did we feel threatened by the high-quality responses this contest generated? Not really, no. But it’s not something we’re prepared to ignore either — and neither should any agency that’s interested in maintaining its accounts.
As younger, savvier marketing executives start calling the shots at the best brands in the world, the “relationships” more traditional-minded agencies rely on for their daily bread will matter less and less, and the quality of work will be the determining factor in who gets paid.
The fact is, with the increasing sophistication of consumer-grade equipment and its relative affordability, more people now have the ability to produce broadcast-quality material. The technical barrier is breached; now all that remains is the creative hurdle. Creativity can come from anywhere. Contests like this and other crowd-sourcing efforts, if well-orchestrated and providing the proper incentives, can make the cream rise to the top. And that means all agencies must push themselves harder than ever to make sure their milk has not gone sour.
Seriously, read the whole article, it’s worth it: http://adage.com/agencynews/article?article_id=144332
Results of the Aflac 10 second “Video Contest”
Posted by Dan L. on June 12th, 2010
The Aflac 10 second video challenge is a great example of the type of video contest you should absolutely, positively stay away from. Sure, the grand prize was $25,000 but unless you’re an internet celebrity you didn’t stand much chance of winning this one. The problem with the Aflac contest is that no matter how awesome your video was the only way to have a shot at the grand prize was if you got enough votes to get you into the top 10. And according to 180 entries were received and more than 69,000 votes were cast. That’s 383 votes per video! I’ve followed the voting of a lot of video contests and I’ve learned that with a few high-profile exceptions like the Crash the Superbowl contest, strangers won’t take the time to register and vote for some contest video they have no stake in. One reason strangers do vote for entries in the Crash the Superbowl contest is because they give Superbowl tickets away every day to one random voter. But I don’t think Aflac awarded any such voter prizes.
So….video quality was totally irrelevant in the first round of this contest. That means there were only two ways for a filmmaker to have a chance of winning. Either they had to already have a pretty serious online following that would unite to propel them into the top ten or they had to vote for themselves over and over and over. The fact that “69,000” votes were cast in this contest isn’t something to brag about. That is a crazy high number and it’s a tell-tale sign of cheating. The average vote count per video was 383. How many people out there even KNOW 383 people, let alone 383 that will take the time to vote for your goofy Aflac commercial?
If you know how video contest work, the numbers here are very suspicious. But to most folks, it sounds like Aflac must be doing a great job connecting with the much sought after, social network crowd. Check out this quote from the I mentioned:
“The passion of the contestants who creatively used their own social networks, generating hundreds of thousands of page views and millions of impressions, combined with their knowledge of our products blew us away,” said Aflac Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer Jeff Charney. “It is clear that people are starting to get to know Aflac and are beginning to learn that we are more than a household name; we are a household need.”
That right there is why you shouldn’t enter video contests like this. Because this wasn’t a video contest. This was a SOCIAL NETWORKING contest. Your entry in the contest was just an excuse for you to send out links to Aflac’s website. They cared about “page views” and gauging the public’s knowledge of their products, not quality entries. So why in the world would you ever want to spend time and energy making a video for a contest like that? Aflac had to realize that they were holding a contest that would encourage people to cheat to win it. I’m guessing they actually wanted cheating to happen because the more votes were cast, the more “connected” with web-users they would seem.
180 entries is about what the Skinit.com video contest got and they also had a grand prize of $25,000. So I guess 180 entries is a pretty good estimate of how many submissions a contest of this size should get. So…before you go entering a “video contest” like this, ask yourself; do I have a large enough social network to get more votes than 171 other people?
The video that won the Aflac challenge is very well made. It’s not insanly awesome though. I have to wonder, what video would have won the $25K if Aflac gave the prize to the BEST entry?
First Place. Prize: $25,000
Did anybody enter this contest? Anybody know what you had to do to register to vote? Or if you could vote more than once? If you have any info, leave a comment.
Has Tony Stark invented the ultimate online voting system?
Posted by Dan L. on June 9th, 2010
Tony Stark unveils his new video contest voting system (I presume)
There are two big reasons to avoid video contests that let “the public” pick the winner. The first is that registering for those contests is always an annoying time-suck. You can only get your friends to go through that kind of hassle a few times before they come down with a serious case of voter-fatigue. The other problem with vote-based video contests is that none of them are cheater-proof. No matter how many legitimate votes you get there will always be some other contestant who is willing to stay up all night registering fake accounts and voting for himself over and over. Those two problems lead to a kind of catch-22 scenario. The easier it is to vote in a contest, the more cheating there will be. And the more safeguards and ID checks there are, the harder it is for real people to cast legitimate votes. This is a problem so complex that only one person could come up with a solution; Ironman!
The Tony Stark Innovation Video Challenge was created as a tie-in for the new Ironman movie and it has a neat concept. Contestants were supposed to create videos that showed off an idea for an invention that could make the world a better place. First place is $15,000 towards making your idea a reality. The deadline to enter was yesterday though so if you have any world-changing ideas you might as well just forget them.
Friend of VCN and multi-contest winner HappyJoel entered this contest and e-mailed me his submission. It’s quite good and features some very fancy, professionally made effects:
Voters don’t determine the winners for this contest but star-ratings do make up a percentage of a submission’s total score. Joel’s video is currently in third place so if you’d like to help him out, click here to vote.
That link is worth clicking on just to see how The Tony Stark Innovation Challenge handles online voting. Their system is quite ingenious. Maybe you’ve heard a bunch of grumbling on the web about Facebook’s new privacy controls. Facebook now lets websites access users accounts for a fee. It sounds a little insidious but it’s mostly harmless. You can opt out of this program by changing your facebook page’s privacy settings. Anyway, the Tony Stark contest utilizes this new feature to register people to vote for their contest.
If you have a Facebook page and if you want to vote for a video you just have to click a button and poof, your facebook page is connected to the contest site. Now you can rate videos once every 24 hours. The once-a-day voting kind of thing is annoying but overall, the whole system is very impressive. You register in one mouse click and its incredibly difficult to register fake accounts. If you wanted to cheat in this contest you would have to:
- Create a fake e-mail address
- Create a fake Facebook account
- Use a proxy server to disguise your IP address
- Visit the contest site and cast your vote
That’s a ton of work. And since votes only count for 20% of a video’s final score, it’s definitely not worth the trouble to cheat. So if you see Robert Downey Jr, tell him he designed a really nice video contest voting system. He won’t know what the hell you’re talking about but after playing Ironman he’s probably used to dealing with crazy nerds so I’m sure he’ll just smile and say thanks.
2010 Skinit.com entries
Posted by Dan L. on June 4th, 2010
The deadline for Skinit.com’s big $50,000 video contest was Monday and it looks like they received at least 150 entries. I say “at least” because filmmakers are still uploading videos 4 days after the deadline. Skinit’s uploader is still active and it sends your video directly to the Skinit channel on youtube. To Skinit’s credit, very few entries that were uploaded after the June 1st deadline have been approved and added to their official contest gallery. But if you throw in the ineligible late entries, Skinit got about 175 submissions total. That’s quite impressive and I hope it means Skinit will bring the contest back next year. You can see all the videos that have thus far been uploaded here:
Though I had been planning for months to enter the Skinit contest I sort of waited until the very last minute to get to work. I finally settled on an idea about 2 weeks before the deadline which gave me just enough time to order and receive the skins I would need. If you remember, Skinit had 6 categories for this contest and one person in each category will win a $5,000 prize. The categories were 60 and 30 second Consumer Electronics skin commercials, 60 and 30 second wall skin commercials and 60 and 30 second Tailgate Skins commercials. I figured most people would enter the Consumer Electronics categories since those would be the cheapest and easiest ads to make. So I decided to go for the tailgate category and I’m quiet proud of the final product. All the actors I used are friends of mine and the shoot turned into an actual cookout. Throw in a dancing horse-man and you have a great way to spend a Saturday afternoon. I wound up getting so much footage that I was able to do a 30 second and a 60 second version of the entry. Here’s the 30 second version of my submission:
Skinit judges ultimately pick the winners but a piece of every contestants final score is based on votes. So if you have 30 seconds to spare, why not do your pal Beardy a solid and throw a couple 5 star votes his way. I could certainly use them. Jerks have already been giving me 1-star ratings to bring my score down.
So how about you? Did you enter the Skinit.com contest? I really like seeing what kind of entries our readers are doing so if you entered and would like a little help schilling for votes, e-mail me a link or leave it in a comment and I will add it to this post.
Here’s a very good entry from Shane F. I think this one is going to be a serious contender:
To rate Shane’s video, click here:
And here’s a funny musical entry from Johnathon M. The chorus is quite catchy:
Godaddy pays out record amount to contest winners
Posted by Dan L. on June 2nd, 2010
Did you watch the Indy 500 on Sunday? Nope, me neither. But I had a good excuse, I was out shooting an entry for the Skinit.com contest. But if you did happen to watch the race on Sunday then maybe you caught the reveal of the winners of Godaddy.com’s first commercial contest. If you didn’t catch the reveal well, I guess it’s a good thing you have the internet. Here they are:
Godaddy has the winning videos posted to their “video.me” site and videos there are stupid hard to embed. So to watch the winning ads, you’ll have to click here: http://videos.godaddy.com/Super-Bowl-Video-Contest
Of the 10 finalists that were announced a few weeks ago, “Go Momma” and the “Get Online Rap” were two of my favorites so I’m glad to see them win. And I’m guessing that marketing nerds across the web were amazed and impressed that godaddy’s top choice was so different that the type of ads they usually put out. To quote Godaddy’s own press release, Go Momma was uncharacteristically “Cleavage-Free.” The ad has aired a few times on TV so keep your eyes open and you might just catch it. I bet Godaddy is going to wind up airing it a lot. As well they should. I think Go Mamma is easily the best GoDaddy commercial ever because instead of being a confusing, PG-rated strip show, it actually explained what Godaddy.com does!
But the big news isn’t really WHO won this contest…it’s HOW MUCH was won. Here’s a quote from that Godaddy press release I mentioned:
“Five Honorable Mention winners will receive $15,000, raising the prize winnings to $250,000, which makes Go Daddy’s “Create Your Own Commercial” contest the highest guaranteed payout of any commercial contest in advertising history.”
Wow. So apparently, Godaddy was so impressed with their finalists that at the last minute they decided to give 5 other videos “Honorable Mentions” awards of $15,000 each. Wait a second…if there were 3 big winners and 5 honorable mentions, that means 2 finalists didn’t get $15K. Man, sucks to be them! (You can see all the Honorable Mention Winners here.)
And there’s some other news to report; the mystery of why this was called Godaddy.com’s Super Bowl video contest has been solved! Turns out the contest was announced on Super Bowl Sunday and it was never Godaddy’s intention to actually air the winning ads during the big game. I follow video contests as closely as pretty much anyone around and I didn’t hear about the godaddy contest until a few days after the superbowl. So the name of the contest never made much sense. Why start a “Superbowl” video contest right after the game just ended? But now that the whole thing is over it’s pretty clear that Godaddy was attempting to out Doritos, Doritos by creating their own, bigger version of the Crash the Superbowl contest. Maybe next year Godaddy will call their contest “Crash the Indy 500.” Or maybe not…that pun is only funny until a racer dies in a flaming wreck.
So is Godaddy gearing up to try and overtake Doritos’ Crash the Superbowl contest as THE must-enter video contest of the year? You know, I certainly hope so. I sort of think the Crash the Superbowl contest has run its course. Yeah it gets bigger every year but a video contest that gets 4,000 entries is just out of control. Godaddy only got about 500 entries but the average quality of those videos BLEW AWAY the average quality of the 2009 Crash the Superbowl entries. Doritos ads have been done to death and it’d be great to see another company step up and make a grab for the title of the Ultimate User-Generated video contest. In fact, I’d like to see Godaddy run this contest again this fall and air the winners during the actual Superbowl. If Doritos does the Crash the Superbowl contest again, it’d make for a great story. Not only would the media be interested in who won each contest, they’d cover the unofficial contest which would be to see which company would air a better User-Generated ad.
