At our recent VQmetrics launch, I mentioned that seeding a video for broad viewership can go a certain distance, but in order for a video to go viral it really needs to hit a nerve.
A new social video ad was uploaded on 25th March by Mini. It is about a couple of guys sitting in a car on the German Autobahn and watching two Minis do some crazy moves. At some point the moves become suspiciously unreal and the guys start commenting that they obviously got drawn into a viral video ad. The end consists of typical TV ad titles and the Mini logo.
This video absolutely hits a nerve. The stats that we have collected over the last 3 days are just amazing:
It hit 30,000 views within 3 days and continues to grow. By today it has taken 9 honours on YouTube.
What is it's secret? Maybe it's the honesty of the ad. It starts out like a dark viral, but at the minute that it is obviously not real any more, the comments make it funny and the effects are quite cool. There is no shame in confirming it as an ad in the end.