Viral Marketing: Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, Adobe Creative Suite
Dec 1, 2008
It's not everyday you get to create a sport. But that's what Goodby, Silverstein & Partners did to generate some viral buzz around Adobe Creative Suite 3, or CS3, with an online sport called Layer Tennis.
The challenge for Goodby was to develop a campaign that creative types-designers, photographers, animators and advertising creatives-would think was cool. Traditional media vehicles weren't likely to work with this group. So the agency combined two facts: creatives are a tightly knit community with an aversion to traditional marketing pitches, and they are, by and large, very competitive.
The answer was Layer Tennis: a Web-based sport that gave creative professionals a chance to compete against each other by flexing their Adobe software muscles for a live online audience.
Word of the new game spread like wildfire among the Web sites and blogs that focus on the creative community. And, presto, almost before Goodby or the client knew it, CS3 became the subject of an intense online conversation among cutting-edge creatives.
Goodby spent no money to advertise Layer Tennis, yet word-of-mouth referrals, fueled by hundreds of blogs, attracted a staggering 50,000 people to the first match. During the course of the season, more than a half million people viewed the match-ups.
It was a runaway success, both for buzz production and the company's bottom line: CS3 made up 64 percent of Adobe's total revenue in 2007. Its CFO was quoted as saying the company's overall financial gains were "…driven primarily by CS3."
"To get [creative professionals] talking, we reinvented a 'sport' that tapped into two unmet desires we observed," Sidney Bosley, senior strategist at Goodby, explains. "First, creatives only show their finished work, never their mastery of the software that led to that work. Second, although they are competitive, they never have the chance to compete against each other head-to-head, live, in front of an audience. So we let them do just that with Adobe software as the playing field."
For more Buzz Awards Coverage coverage:
2008 Buzz Awards Winners
Millions Are Talking: Do you know who is creating the buzz?
Grand Prize Winner: McDonald's Brave New World
Event Marketing: ABC Domestic TV, Dr. Scholl's for Her
Online: Proximity Canada, Alka-Seltzer
Viral Marketing: Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, Adobe Creative Suite
Music: The Marketing Arm, AT&T
Outdoor/Out-of-Home: Butler Shine Stern & Partners, MINI Cooper
Print: Fallon Minneapolis, Sci Fi Channel
Radio: OMD, Visa
Reality TV: Mediavest Worldwide, Herbal Essences
Scripted Television: R&R Partners, Valley Metro
Social Media: OMD, McDonald's
Sports: Mediavest, Sprite
Wireless: Moxie Interactive, FOX Studios/Jumper
Integrated Campaign: Campfire, Verizon/a>
Public Relations: Coburn Communications and AARP
User-Generated: Catapult Marketing, Pedigree
Film/Movie: Davie Brown Entertainment, Mountain Dew
Buzz People's Choice Awards