Converse with your users, and all else will follow – Part Three

This post is the third of a series highlighting the inspiration and execution behind some of the more innovative and successful custom advertising programs on YouTube. Check out Part One and Part Two of the series. -Ed.

A common theme we've seen in the campaigns we've highlighted is the interaction and conversation between users and advertisers. Whether producing episodic content, integrating social media such as Twitter, giving users a chance to earn fame and prizes, or simply a conversation with their favorite YouTube celebrity, they have strongly engaged the user community. We've been talking about the importance of engagement ever since the first major ad campaigns on YouTube, and there's a reason for it. Engagement leads to better brand recognition and general ad performance.

Lesson #3: Allow Users to Take Your Campaign and Run With It

Carl’s Jr. (CKE Restaurants) is well-known for its sense of humor and edgy television advertising -- who can forget the TV spot they ran in 2005, featuring a scantily clad Paris Hilton soaping up a Bentley and digging into a Spicy BBQ Six Dollar Burger? For the launch of their new Portobello Mushroom Burger, CKE tapped into a new kind of celebrity to showcase their product: popular YouTube users.

The nine homegrown YouTube celebrities enlisted by CKE each created humorous, light-hearted takes on how they would dig into Carl's Jr.'s new Portobello Mushroom Burger. These YouTube stars also encouraged their aggregate fan base of nearly 4 million loyal followers to upload videos showing how they would enjoy the new burger. This campaign echoed far and wide amongst Carl’s target audience, resulting in nearly 10 million views for all of the videos.

iJustine, or Justine Ezarik

Not only did the campaign create a dialogue and sense of community around a new product, but sales of Portobello Mushroom Burger doubled from the period before the launch of the campaign on YouTube. The campaign also won an OMMA award this year in the “Best in Show” category.

Carl’s Jr. is not the only example of a brand extending its campaign to users and encouraging them to make videos themselves. HP also extended their “Hands” commercials to the YouTube community for their recent "You on You" campaign.

HP You on You Project

The campaign contained a simple and engaging call-to-action video that asked YouTube users in 21 different countries to create a video that expressed who they are -- but without revealing their faces. Previously, HP “Hands” commercials were filmed with stars such as Jerry Seinfeld or Pharrell, but this contest allowed a worldwide audience to participate in HP’s iconic campaign. HP also featured a webcam application and a remixer tool (allowing users to create their own videos using pre-made content from HP) on the HP brand channel, to make the creative and sharing process easier for contestants. It clearly worked, because the results were phenomenal: the "You on You" channel received thousands of entries and more than 2.5 million views from people in 175 countries.

Many of the campaigns in this blog series have empowered users to participate in a dialogue with brands, and sometimes even own elements of YouTube campaigns themselves. Together they've earned three OMMA Awards and a Gold Lion at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival. As the largest online video destination in the world, YouTube is full of ways like these for advertisers to engage users and break new ground in the digital world.

Posted by Jane Yu, Sales Development