Homer Simpson just saved the day (with a little help from YouTube)
Move over, commercials—Homer Simpson on YouTube is here. In the trending “Homer Simpson saves the day with YouTube” ad, he promotes a business called Mr. Plow. Of course, he does so in a very Homer-esque way, with Lisa helping him with advertising when she creates a TrueView ad campaign. Pretty genius. Then, in the YouTube video, we viewers hear and see “Mr. Plow” so many times, it’s impossible we’ll forget it. And Homer’s phone blows up with calls as a result. The YouTube idea is an effort aimed at helping small and mid-sized businesses. We’d say it’s a success, especially with the ever-popular Homer Simpson as its spokesman.
The “Mr. Plow” episode aired on The Simpsons back in 1992 (!), during Season 4, in the pre-YouTube days of yore. In that episode, Homer buys a snowplow truck after wrecking both family cars in a snowstorm. Then, he starts a business, Mr. Plow. All is well… until Barney starts a snowplow business, too, stealing Homer’s customers. Of course, hilarity ensues. You can see the “Mr. Plow” commercial here.
The YouTube ad for it went live on Dec. 17 after YouTube collaborated with Gracie Films, FOX, and ad agency Camp + King. So, not only will people go back and watch the episode, but others will probably be inspired to use TrueView to help build their businesses, too. A win-win for everyone.
And, we’ve all seen this type of thing in action before. We’re watching one of our fave TV shows and the characters eat a certain name-brand cereal or coffee. It seeps into our subconscious and, the next time we’re grocery shopping, we inevitably buy it because we want to eat the same cereal as name-your-favorite-character just did.
According to this Marketing Land piece, YouTube said this is the first time that small and medium-sized businesses are the majority of advertisers on YouTube. In addition, the number of SMB advertisers has doubled (!) in the past two years. So, the site doesn’t just help big-time businesses but all-sized ones.
Yay or nay? I say, if other people do it, why not Homer Simpson?
The Google and Your Business blog helps define Homer’s YouTube campaign in layman’s terms, too. YouTube analytics can determine how long people watch the content, how many people visit your site, how many people like, comment on, and share the ad. No view goes uncounted. The blog states:
Innnnteresting.
You can see what all the rage is about here when you check out the Mr. Plow commercial for yourself.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyi67AJhB74
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(Image via YouTube)