Unless you’ve been hiding away on a deserted tropical island, you have probably heard some talk recently about the “new” Old Spice Man.  The nightly television newscasters are talking about him, women are calling in to their local radio stations to find out how to meet him and he has been the topic of the day across many internet sites.  Why all this buzz about a brand, that until recently was, well… old?

Talk about the power of utilizing social media to drive word of mouth and help reinvent a brand.

Acting on an off-the-wall idea of creating instant buzz by responding in real time to consumers questions/comments with short videos, Procter & Gamble produced funny YouTube videos about Old Spice.  The team leveraged Twitter, Facebook, Reddit and blogs sending out invitations to ask questions of The Old Spice Man.

As people responded, their comments were pulled in and tracked and those who had interesting questions or were high-profile users on social networks were responded to directly in real time with a personalized short video featuring the dashing shirtless actor and former football player Isaiah Mustafa.  Over 200 videos were posted to YouTube over the course of two days and featured everything from a marriage proposal to messages to celebrities.

Check out this one which includes the real-life marriage proposal:

You can see all of the videos here.

It turned out to be a huge success.  Old Spice received over 83 million YouTube video views and grew their Facebook fan base by 616K all in the the course of two days.

I love it when a campaign goes viral.   But what, besides a touch of good luck, makes a campaign like this so successful?  When a campaign becomes an overnight sensation, it’s always beneficial to look back at what worked and why.  Here are a few take-aways and tips from this campaign that can be applied in making other social media campaigns a success:

- Take a chance on doing something different, something that has never been done before.  The videos, created in real-time in direct response to consumers were not complicated, but it was a new concept, and that gets people talking.

- Make it personal. The Old Spice videos feel like they’re personalized, even if they weren’t directed at you.  The fact that they are directed at real people, based on real comments/questions gives viewers the feeling of being included in the campaign

- Appeal to peoples’ egos.  People love to be acknowledged, heard and accepted.  This campaign made consumers feel that they were being listened and responded to.  Those people that got responses, and many others, have Tweeted, shared on Facebook and self-promoted links to the videos back out across their social networks.

- Make it creative, entertaining and funny.  The entertainment value in itself offered something worthwhile to consumers.  These are just plain fun to watch!

-  Create a conversation.  The real-time, rapid response to consumers made it feel that the Old Spice Man was actually having real-time conversations, providing them direct contact with the brand.

- Promote and build the campaign offline as well.  Old Spice began to create interest before the online campaign and built a smaller base of fans by running a few  TV commercials of the Old Spice Man and then posting those on YouTube.

- Know and engage your influencers.  Old Spice purposefully made sure they included and responded to consumers with huge followings on social networks or those with credibility and influence over others in the social media world.  These influencers told their many followers, these followers told their friends, and word spread rapidly.

Keep these tips in mind the next time you’re planning a social media campaign and you’ll be on the right track to success.  Your brand could soon be the talk of the town!