Earlier this year, a commercial promoting a monthly razor company called “Dollar Shave Club” went extremely viral. Before I begin my social preaching, sit back and watch the commercial below:
Now, tell me you didn’t chuckle here and there from this video! Starring Dollar Shave Club’s founder and CEO himself, Michael Dubin, this video hit YouTube by storm with over 10 million views so far by viewers and even made the company’s site crash within an hour after posting. With over 12,000 orders arriving in the first two days of this video, this video is becoming known as having one of the best ROI ever. Only costing $4,500 without any outside agency production team and taking a day to shoot, Dollar Shave Club’s success can be pinpointed to three reasons:
1. Emphasize your company’s personality and culture
As founder of the company, Dubin did a fantastic job at showing his own quirky and comedic personality throughout the video. He also did his company’s overall image justice by positioning his product in a very creative and honest way. With facts about the company’s service and products being thrown out in between comedic punches, Dubin walks around his actual warehouse and fulfillment center as a natural mascot for the Dollar Shave Club. There weren’t any huge firework displays or million dollar green screen effects because none were needed. Dubin made his ad relevant and realistic to the public, which is a very strong reason as to its overall effectiveness and popularity on the web.
2. Go Social.
The above video was released onto Reddit, which undoubtedly helped the company to go viral. Find your niche market and share, share, share. Using social media is so important these days for your company to garner the attention and traction it needs, especially up against bigger competitors and companies like Schick and Gillette. By making content that is engaging, humorous, and even outrageous at times, Dollar Shave Club was able to get a ton of extra views. By creating something that’s too hard to resist sharing, your company may find itself trending all over the internet in a good way.
3. Have good connections.
One of the other reasons why this video did so well was because Dubin had a ton of connections from his past work experience. From working in New York City at NBC and MSNBC to his days now in Los Angeles, Dubin definitely had a great base of support to help out with the video. The commercial was even shot by his good friend from comedy school, Lucia Aniello. Don’t be afraid to network early on because you may just need those connections to help you out later on in life!
With subscriptions starting at only, you guessed it, $1 per month, the success of Dollar Shave Club’s commercial is one of the smartest, most cost-effective ads ever. In this social day and age, small companies have just as good of a chance to reach the consumer as ever. So tell me, what’s your next big viral idea?
Photo Credit: Flickr user Codenamecueball
