Image: Twitter

Earlier today I came across a Tweet asking why businesses should use Twitter. As I thought about it, I could come up with countless ways that I see it as beneficial, bot only for my sake with my company, but also for businesses of all sizes.

I also was asked a few weeks ago as to how using Twitter could be beneficial for my company. The obvious first question posed to me was Can we make money off it? Which was quickly followed up with Can this be automated?

While I had answers to the later questions, I was stuck verbalizing how it could be beneficial. As a PR guy, this should have been easy, but I found it useful to show the positive interactions that I had with our customers, and also showed a way to bring in some money and even better vibes among our customers.

Back to the tweet, the previously mentioned query linked back to a post on HighTalk titled Why Twitter? A Here’s Why Guide for Business. Not only does the article give some great reasons for using Twitter, but also has an embedded PowerPoint from Highland Communications on the uses of Twitter for business.

If only I had this a few weeks ago ~ hopefully it can help some of you if you have to answer the question for your bosses.

Well what a week it’s been. I am sure by now everyone is done with their Super Bowl hangovers. Outside of Pittsburgh and Arizona, everyone tuned in for the commercials – and I’m sure some viewers in Arizona were wishing they saw the commercials.

It leads me to wonder who the big winner was. While Budweiser made a number of big splashes with their Clydesdales and humorous Bud Light spots, I would not categorize them as the winner.

I know you’re thinking the creepy eTrade baby may have been numero uno, but again wrong.

The 3-D dancing lizards with my man Ray Lewis? Maybe if Stop & Shop or Shaw’s had the glasses. Damn you “super stores.”

My favorite was perhaps the most realistic of all of the commercials from our friends at Bridgestone.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRofF_v6kk0]

Not only is the ad realistic comical, but it combines one of our favorite toys of yesteryear going through an experience that we all have, the nagging spouse. Now if only we could find a way to pop off her lips when we’re getting yelled at. I’ll take the eyes any day.

You can check out how Fox Sports ranked the ads, do you agree? Or do you have another one in mind?

YouTube is filled with millions of videos from everyone from middle school kids to cartoons to backyard wrestling

Image courtesy of WiiRally.com

and MMA. Hell even my grandmother made an appearance on YouTube (a 79 year old dancing with a fratboy is always good for some laughs). After watching thousands of videos during December, I broke down the videos that get a ton of traction into four groups without touching on kids committing acts of violence with an eye to applying the findings to my company:

1. Commercials with celebrities
2. Comedy & Humor (sometimes associated with companies)
3. Charity related
4. Stupid people tricks

Commercials with celebrities

This category was filled with a number of videos that gained instant traction due to their credibility with the celebrity featured in the commercial and were typically with a large brand.  This category also held a video that came with the most controversy on if it was fact or fiction. In Nike’s ad to promote Kobe Bryant’s new sneaker, the Laker star jumps over a speeding Aston Martin. With a national audience surrounding the NBA Kobe’s response to a reporter’s question over if he had done this, he replied “It’s Hollywood baby!,” which spurned many knockoff videos and exposure flicks on how the video was faked.

This category also featured a brilliant video from EA Sports that addressed a video of a user who exposed a glitch in Tiger Woods Golf where Tiger can walk on water.  The video then goes on to have Tiger address the video and take a shot after walking on water.

Keeping in line with the video game them, Guitar Hero’s video of Heidi Klum drew the ire of network television for being too racy. The slimmed down and less scandalous commercial still drew critical acclaim with papers and television stations, even landing in the middle of a rant from Bill O’Reilly.

The group also has a pseudo-celebrity in the group, Mr. Fong, from IBM. The videos were featured in B@B and asked users to help Mr. Fong reunite with his crew. While the viewership was not a true viral case study, it was watched by the core customer base of the computer giant.

On the lighter side

This group was headlined by videos for Ray Ban and Levis. Using a soft sell, the videos feature the products through some zany antics. In the case of Ray Ban, two guys are seen catching sunglasses thrown at them on thier face everywhere from a couch to a speeding car. The Levis commercial has a group of twenty-something guys jumping into a pair of 501′s that climaxes with a backflip off a seesaw into the jeans.

Charity related

This category is dominated by Starbucks, two of the more popular ones were for their voting campaign and their red cup campaign.

Stupid people tricks

This is my favorite viral group. Without using violence these videos portrayed some skits that were both funny and thought invoking. Perhaps the most famous was the Mentos & Diet Coke video. The mad scientists do a variety of experiments with Mentos and Diet Coke to get some explosive reactions. Not only did this video succeed in having a number of spin offs made on YouTube, but it  also was turned into a special on MythBusters. One video in this category that I could not fathom, but it got a lot of views was trampoline skateboarding. I must be getting old, but this has zero appeal to me. Do you get it?

While my report may have hit on some key areas of viral videos, I am sure I missed out on some key ones. Let me know what you think, or share your favorite videos with me. I will share my company’s video when we get around to it. So without further adieu, I offer to you my favorite viral video of all time

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JMOh-cul6M]