As if the Old Spice frontman couldn’t get any more viral love these days, Isaiah Mustafa has returned on Old Spice’s YouTube page with dozens of personalized videos responding to fan comments and questions. People can comment and ask questions via YouTube or Twitter.
The Old Spice Guy won fame months ago for being ultra-masculine and egotistical in three ad spots for Old Spice body wash.
The humourous personalized vids reach out to popular Twitter celebs such as Alyssa Milano and Digg founder Kevin Rose, but also to average people, such as users called LatinStoner, DoubleZeroNine and TooScottToTrot. Mustafa even went meta and replied to a Twitter comment he sent to himself. Mustafa is topless and clad in only a wrapped bath towel. The set is the sparse shower area where the Old Spice ads take place.
What are people asking the Old Spice actor? Some wonder why he didn’t say “I’m on a bike” in his recent viral ad online, since he said I’m on a horse in the first marketing hit. He says, “I just wasn’t feeling it, it went in a direction…but I’ll say it for you. ‘I’m on a bike’.”
Another commenter asked him what university he attended. Others, like Demi Moore, just cry out “I want a special video response.” The comments are not always questions, but simple statements: “You could entertain me for hours causing me to lose my job. Which would be bad.” Mustafa replies, “I hope that doesn’t happen but if you do find yourself out of work, try explaining what I look like to strangers. Usually people will hand you money for this.”
The humour especially shines during one commenter’s request, “Can U Ask my girlfriend to marry me?” This time, the props and set get a momentary facelift during Mustafa’s witty response.
Starbucks’ Twitter account asked the topless Mustafa if he was cold. “Need some coffee?” Starbucks suggested. Mustafa replied in a personalized video: “Thank you for the offer but I like to keep warm by boiling a large pot of water, putting a handful of uncooked lobster tortellini in my mouth and dunking my head in for 12 to 14 minutes until the tasty seafood delight melts in my mouth.”
This marketing coup is pure genius, says an advertising executive. Jon Finkelstein, partner in creative at Grip Ltd in Toronto, says any pitchman could reply to tweets and comments online, but making personalized videos is “brave.” He adds, “I love it. People are talking about Old Spice, your grandfather’s brand that has suddenly become cool.”
Finkelstein also admires how these videos simply started appearing online, without any announcement. No TV spot asked people to send in comments, Finkelstein says, and going grassroots with this kind of campaign will get you noticed. “Look, we’re talking about it, so the ads are working,” Finkelstein points out.
The Old Spice social media team seems to be working at a frenzied pace. In the past 30 minutes at the time of publication, Old Spice uploaded five YouTube videos, one as long as 1:03.
See below for several Old Spice replies:
