I’m sitting over a beer with Allan Kent, head of AtPlay, the digital division of Saatchi &
Saatchi, and creative director, Alan Cronje. I ask about the potential of viral film in South
Africa. Kent’s statement: “Viral isn’t a strategy, it’s an adjective,’ throws me off as I
was hoping for a solution like: “make it shit hot’ and that would be it, box ticked, simple
write up and we can get on with drinking beer.
But it’s not that easy. Firstly, Kent doesn’t drink (Cronje makes up for that) and
secondly, marketers don’t fully appreciate the stupendous amount of media on the web.
Says Cronje: “So many clients want to see their TV ads go viral. But to stand out from
the clutter and become one of the most liked, tweeted things out there, you need to be
incredibly entertaining, really authentic and not oversell the brand.’ Put that in a
strategy and you’ll be crying in your beer.
“What’s vital is to understand the community you’re talking to,’ explains Kent.
Quicksilver’s viral video, which appears to show surfers detonating a bomb in a river in
order to ride the ensuing wave, is a good example of this. It tapped the attitude of the
worldwide boarding community and exploded on the Internet.
I meet digital leadership researcher and educator, Dave Duarte, for a much needed
coffee. Like Kent and Cronje, he echoes the need to speak to communities in their own
language. It’s also important to know what the zeitgeist is.
“If it’s hot, ride the wave,’ he says, “timing’s essential. Whatever’s topical is more likely
to spread, so don’t fight upstream.’
Another factor is who you feed it to – well connected people of influence in the relevant
fields is key.
To my surprise, Duarte adds an insight from The Bible. He refers to the Matthew Effect
of accumulated advantage: “For to all those who have, more will be given.’ He relates
this to viral content by explaining the more likes or tweets something has, the more
others feel comfortable sharing it.
With this in mind, I meet Jon Cherry of Cherryflava Media who specialises in experiential
marketing. Cherry challenges the perception that success is measured by how many
views something gets. “The Old Spice ad may have been viewed by millions globally, but
that doesn’t mean it’s a success here.’
Cherry hones in on aspects particular to South Africa. “The advantage of increased
bandwidth will be that more stories and information will be spread within Internet
communities.’ One of the upsides, he believes, is that it will give them relevance by
seeing their initiatives take root online. “It used to be that when you cracked the nod on
TV, that was the thing, but here is something more accessible.’
Viral film is new to us. Our limited Internet makes South Africa a small market. On top of
that it’s segmented, culturally as well as economically. For our work to be relevant we
need to understand the communities we are speaking to; be authentic, topical, attract
influential people and of course, make it shit hot.
