velocity
The JKWeddingDance video was real; the viral effect was MANUFACTURED – Post 1 of 2
originally investigated and reported on Friday July 31, 2009 by Augustine Fou, with Tugce Esener @tesener
Several friends and colleagues had the same reaction when they found out about this video — that it was at such a high view count already and we were late to the party of finding out. Then we did some more digging — digital forensics 🙂 And this is a case where a viral hit was indeed successfully manufactured. There’s something to be learned from all this — how to successfully manufacture a viral video sensation and make viral profits.
Related: How to manufacture a viral video sensation and make viral profits – Post 2 of 2
Chris Brown is successfully tapping into the viral halo of a funny video that coincidentally used his song.
ReadWriteWeb article on how rights owners (Sony, Chris Brown) can make viral profits on other people using their work instead of suing them – http://bit.ly/KA3HI
The video was real. But promotional activities (possibly/likely paid) created the initial viral effect (led to the tipping point of the viral effect) which then got carried a further by people thinking they were simply late to the party, including myself (e.g. 440k bit.ly clicks and 3k detectable retweets out of the 13M views). The numbers don’t jive.
The viral halo has added 1 million more views to the video from August 1 – August 2. (13.1 M to 14.5 M)
Ten ELEVEN TWELVE THIRTEEN proof points to follow, each with screen shot to illustrate.
1a. anyone notice that the “Forever” soundtrack is remarkably consistent throughout the video as if it were dubbed or added in after the original footage was shot. The sound is too consistent in volume and loudness to have come from a built-in, on-camera microphone. At the very end of the video, once it cuts back to the couple at the altar the sound quality goes back to the echo-y, tinny sound of an on-camera mic.
1b. The “TheKHeinz” user on YouTube was registered on July 19, 2009, the day the video was posted. We usually look for clues like this to detect “plants” by PR agencies. This is an issue of trust — a user “CmdrTaco” on Slashdot has been around the forums for years, made hundreds of posts, and was rated by the community very highly. PR agencies trying to seed stories have to create new user accounts during the PR campaign (recent registration date) and have made no other posts or uploads before (no history).
2. The social intensity detected in all of the top social venues like Technorai, Delicious, Reddit, Digg, etc. indicate there was not enough organic sharing to support a view count of 13 million views in 11 days (updated: 14.6 million today August 2, 2009).
a) Bit.ly shows only 447k clicks on the shortened URL
“At Fortune’s Brainstorm:Tech conference Ashton Kutcher effectively took credit for boosting the views from – in his words – 12,500 views before he tweeted the link – to some 1.2 million views 12 hours later…”
Well, unfortunately he used a bit.ly link which provides public analytics on how many people clicked. Most tweets result in immediate traffic, which then tails off immediately after the tweet falls off the first page. In his case, look at the following bit.ly stats URL and click “past month” to see the peak clicks on July 23. All he can actually claim is that his tweet drove a peak of about 100,000 clicks on that day not 1.2 million 🙁
http://bit.ly/info/Z7vMw
too bad Ashton. next time you make a BMOC claim, be sure to use a non trackable method, so analytics won’t “out” you so easily.
after only 3.5 days of retweets the twitter intensity died off to next-to-nothing; if this were a truly viral video, carried forth by real people (and not by paid PR support and paid media) the retweet intensity would remain high. As of August 21, there are over 21M views on the video and the 505k retweets does not show actual organic support for that number.
b) Twitturly shows only 3 thousand retweets on the YouTube URL itself
c) Delicious shows only 447 bookmarks of the video itself
d) Reddit only shows 673 thumbs up for the video itself
e) Technorati shows only 277 blog mentions of the video itself — this could be undercounting if blogs used URL shorteners. But if you look at the blog intensity results (below) sorted by blogs with most authority the blogs have very little authority (i.e. influence or size of audience).
— these are real indications of interest by real people. The social intensity of the passalong for this video does not substantiate the huge number of views in 11 days.
What we are seeing now is the additional viral halo, as the momentum is sustained by large media outlets reporting on the story — even Google Blog blogged about it (boasting about the success of YouTube advertising in driving revenues). Of course TechCrunch is right that viral videos can be monetized: http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/07/30/youtube-viral-wedding-videos-are-great-for-advertising/ )
3. Twitter shows nothing in the top “trending topics” related to this video – indicating few people are actually tweeting about it — if this video is SO viral (13M views in 11 days) then it has GOT to show up on a scan of social intensity. (see screen capture below)
July 31 (Friday) August 2 (Sunday)
4. The original video was posted July 19, 2009. The people from the video appeared on NBC’s Today Show and danced around Rockerfeller Center on July 25th (6 calendar days after posting). Today Show staff may be great at spotting news, but to get all the wedding party from the wedding to re-enact the dance on the Today Show in 6 calendar days — too good to be true? Hmm…
5. Out of all the wedding videos on YouTube, how did Chris Brown detect this particular one that used his song. @glenngabe noted that there are song detection mechanisms – ContentID – which detect the pattern of the copyrighted song and report that to the rights owners. We know there are hundreds, if not thousaands, or really funny wedding home videos — America’s Funniest Videos has been running for years and years on TV showing funny wedding blooper videos that people submitted to them.
6. ALL TEN of the top viral videos on AdAge’s Viral Video Chart took around 3 – 6 months to achieve full viral effect — not 6 days. See all 10 videos’ stats, as reported by YouTube at the following link. This video has not shown up at all on the list of Adage viral videos.
AdAge Top Viral Videos all take 3 – 6 months to reach full viral effect
7. From @RedW0rm – YouTube Declares Wedding Video a Financial Success – http://bit.ly/9ZUtu
8. also check the velocity of this http://twitter.com/#search?q=jkwedding or this http://twitter.com/#search?q=jkweddingdance notice the tweets are not seconds apart but hours apart. Something that achieved 13M views in the 11 days since posting would show far higher velocity or twitter intensity.
9. For a top-trending topic on twitter, there is usually correspondingly high search volume that is detectable. At first glance, terms related to this viral video like “jkwedding” or “jk wedding dance” all seem to spike. But if you put it against even “Corazon Aquino” (one of the top trending topics NOW on Twitter) those JK wedding search volumes are dwarfed. (see chart below).
10. Google only reports 366 links to the video and most of them are not even important websites (see Alexa blue bar)
11. The video itself has no honors and no stats (yet); YouTube stats are conveniently turned off. Other videos have their stats graphs publicly available.
12. see the fine print in the YouTube description — For more information or to make a donation towards violence prevention please visit our website: http://www.jkweddingdance.com/ — why would a normal wedding video ask people to make a donation towards violence prevention? (see screen capture below), the WHOIS record shows the domain jkweddingdance.com was created 29-Jul-09 — today is 31-Jul-09
Updated: This was circumstantial evidence. A source confirmed that Jill is studying patterns of violence propagation for her PhD. Their choice of charity was their own choice. And the site was set up to help that cause.
Conclusion? The video itself is real, made by those nice people in the wedding. They may not even realize why or how their wedding video went viral (and the tens of thousands of other wedding videos on YouTube did not). On the Today Show, “The couple told Lauer they were surprised at the video’s popularity” (also see NY Daily News article – http://bit.ly/OA3iG )
Related articles:
ReadWriteWeb – Build Profit Not DMCA Suits
WSJ – YouTube Declares Wedding Video a Financial Success
PSFK – Co-opting Viral Hits to Sell More Music
TechCrunch – YouTube: Viral Wedding Videos Are Great For Advertising
Huffington Post – Viral Wedding on YouTube Drives Buyers to Chris Brown Music
Share this:
Tags: 1 million, 1a, adage, adage viral video, adage viral video chart, Alexa, All, America, americas funniest videos, Anyone, article, Ashton, Ashton Kutcher, August, august 1, Augustine, authority, Benjamin Peterson, best viral video, bit, blog, botto, bottom, Cadbury, calendar, calendar days, camera microphone, capture, case, Center, centeron, chart, Chris, Chris Brown, chris brown forever, chris brown song in wedding video, chris brown's, chris brown's handlers, chris brown\s reaction to wedding dance video, colleagues, com, contentID, Corazon Aquino, Coronado, count, Courtyard, Dance, dancing, day, define viral video, definition of viral video, definition viral video, Delicious, description, detection mechanism, detection mechanisms, Digg, digging, digital forensic evidence, digital forensics, digital science, domain, domestic violence, donation, down the aisle, effect, ELEVEN, end domestic violence, ESENER, Eyebrows, filet o fish, financial success, fine, forensics, Fou, friday, full viral, funniest viral video, funny viral video, funny wedding entrance, funny wedding entrance video, funny wedding video, funny wedding video with chris brown song, funny wedding viral video, google, GOT, halo, Hamilton, hero viral video, hit, hmm, Hotel, how to make a viral video, http://www.jkwedding.com/, indication, information, intensity, interest, issue, jar of butter viral video, jill peterson, jive, jk wedding, jk wedding dance, jk wedding entrance, jk Wedding Entrance Dance, jk wedding entrance dance video, JK Wedding Video, jkwedding ballet, jkwedding dance, jkwedding entrance, jkwedding jk, jkwedding video, jkwedding.com, jkweddingdance, Jul, July, kevin heinz, link, loudness, ly, make a viral video, make viral video, making a viral video, marketing viral video, Marriott, marriott courtyard hotel, marriott hotel, most viewed viral video, most viral video, NBC, new viral video, nothing, notice, Numa Numa Guy, numa numa guy geico, number, numbers don, online viral video, party, peak, peope, plants, point, post, pr agencies, pr campaign, PR stunts fake, prevention, print, profits, promotional activities, proof, proof points, reaction, ReadWriteWeb, record, Reddit, registrant, Related, Rockerfeller, Samsung, screen, screen capture, search, sensation, Sheep, shot, show, slashdot, social intensity, social venues, something, Song, song in funny wedding entrance, sony, sony bmg, sony pr, sony pr efforts, sony pr team, sony social marketing, sound, sound quality, staff, street, success, support, T-Mobile, t-mobile dance, TEN, tesener, the viral video, TheKHeinz, THIRTEEN, thru, tinny sound, tipping point, today, today show, top, top viral video, Tugce, tweet, TWELVE, twitt(url)y, twitter, twitter intensity, twitter pass-along, uploads, URL, user, user accounts, velocity, video, video 3, Videos, view, violence, violence prevention, vir, Viral, viral effect is manufactured, viral halo, viral profits, viral video, viral video 2010, viral video ad, viral video ads, viral video blogs, viral video campaign, viral video campaigns, viral video chart, viral video charts, viral video clip, viral video clips, viral video companies, viral video company, viral video definition, viral video film, viral video film school, viral video funny, viral video girl, viral video girls, viral video marketing, viral video of the day, viral video production, viral video school, viral video show, viral video sites, viral video top, viral video websites, viral video youtube, viral videos, visit, was jk wedding video real?, website, wedding, wedding dance, Wedding Entrance Dance, wedding entrance video, wedding party, what is a viral video, what is viral video, WHOIS, whois record, Work, YouTube, youtube viral video
social media benchmarks
UPDATED: January 19, 2013
Facebook Sponsored Stories CTR, CPC Benchmarks
ORIGINAL POST:
Many clients have asked about social media benchmarks or social marketing benchmarks. They ask things like how many fans should they have on Facebook? They are concerned if they cannot project 1 million fans on their fan page.
But that is because most clients are coming from a reach and frequency background. Some have moved to unique visitors, pageviews, and time on site. But what is more important today is not that people get to the site or the time they spend, but what they do … so social intensity is a benchmark which captures the quantity and frequency of social actions like sharing, discussing, commenting, voting, etc. All of these actions lead to value that accumulates for other future visitors to the site.
Adwords – lower cost per click
Clicks Impressions CTR Avg Cost per Click Total spent
511 61,894 0.82% $0.47 per click $242.16
PayPerPost – optimal is lowest payment per post
dollars pageviews/clicks
$122.50 2630/120 $1.02 per click 4.6% CTR ($5 per post)
$183.25 1324/114 $1.61 per click 8.6% CTR ($10 per post)
$291.25 2369/260 $1.12 per click 11% CTR ($20 per post)
ReviewMe – www. johnchow. com
$300 – nearly no value; JohnChow pioneered link sharing to get his blog up to about rank 100 on Technorati before they changed the way they calculated authority; despite the many links to his blog, it was practically useless in driving any useful customers. Now his site has been penalized by Google and is only PageRank 3 site.
StumbleUpon – extremely useful in helping new users discover the site and features; the velocity of the clicks was incredible (approx 300 clicks in 5 minutes) BEST VALUE OVERALL flat rate $0.05 per click; you set the daily budget
Facebook benchmarks like Facebook CTRs, Facebook CPCs, and Facebook CPMs can be found here.
Share this:
Tags: "benchmarking the value of a facebook fan", "facebook ads" why is ctr low, 1 million, 511, ads cpm average 2010 price, Adwords, adwords benchmarks, adwords click rate benchmark, adwords ctr, approx, authority, average click through rate facebok ads, average click through rate for facebook ads, average cost of Facebook ad, average CPC facebook, average CPCs, Avg, background, benchmark, benchmark ad clicks, benchmark page views, benchmark social media, benchmark social media links, benchmarking facebook, benchmarking for social media, benchmarking social media, benchmarks, benchmarks for social media, benchmarks social networks, BEST, blog, branded video ads facebook cpm, budget, cannot, Clicks, clicks to impressions benchmark, com, cost, cost per click, cpc avergae, CPCs, cpm ctr cpc, CPMs, CTR, CTR facebook ads, ctr in facebook, CTR youtube ad average, CTRs, difference between conversions and actions fa..., Digital Benchmarks, digital marketing, DIGITAL MARKETING $20 per month, digital marketing solutions, display advertising benchmarks, effectiveness of facebook ads, Facebook, facebook ad campaign performance, facebook ad click rate, facebook ad click through rate, facebook ad clicks, facebook ad ctr ratio, facebook ad effectiveness, facebook ad rates cpm, facebook ad specs, facebook ads click through rate, facebook ads cost effective?, facebook ads cpm rates, facebook ads effectiveness, facebook ads impressions or clicks, facebook ads low ctr, facebook advertisers, facebook advertising costs, facebook advertising cpc, facebook advertising ctr, facebook advertising effectiveness, facebook advertising effectiveness 2009, facebook advertising media rates, Facebook advertising metrics, facebook average click through rate 2009, facebook average stay 2010, facebook benchmarks, facebook click average cost, facebook click through rate, facebook click through rates, facebook cpc ctr, facebook CTR, facebook ctr average rates, facebook ctr rates, facebook metrics, fan, fan page, frequency, google, impressions, intensity, izea, JohnChow, link, marketing, online ad click through rate benchmarks, online advertising cpc benchmarks, online display ads ctr benchmarks, optimal, OVERALL, page, PageRank, pageviews, payment, PayPerPost, payperpost benchmarks, post, project, project 1, quantity, rank, rate, reach, ReviewMe, search advertising benchmarks, setting benchmarks in social media, site, social actions, social benchmarks, social marketing, social marketing benchmarks, social marketing metrics, Social Media Ad Metrics, social media benchmark, social media benchmarking, social media benchmarks, social media marketing benchmarks, social media metrics, social networks, social-metrics, StumbleUpon, stumbleupon advertising, stumbleupon cpc, Technorati, the average price for click throughs CPC, the social network benchmark, time, today, unique visitors, value, velocity, viral content benchmarking, voting, way, web 3.0 benchmark, what is a facebook ad ctr, what is a good ctr rate in facebook, what is the average click through rate for li..., what is the average CTR for contextual ad, what's the avrage conversion rate on a facebo..., whats a good click through rate facebook, www, xxxx
Digital Consigliere
Dr. Augustine Fou is Digital Consigliere to marketing executives, advising them on digital strategy and Unified Marketing(tm). Dr Fou has over 17 years of in-the-trenches, hands-on experience, which enables him to provide objective, in-depth assessments of their current marketing programs and recommendations for improving business impact and ROI using digital insights.
http://twitter.com/acfou
Send Tips: tips@go-digital.net
Digital Strategy Consulting
Dr. Augustine Fou LinkedIn Bio
Digital Marketing Slideshares
The Grand Unified Theory of Marketing
Collaborators – Digital Profs
Pages
Tags
Prototype Web Services
- drag2share – quickly share news items by drag and drop on email addresses
- LivePhotoFrame – upload and remotely manage a digital photo frame via unique URL
- MedleyTuner – create a continuous listening experience by uploading mp3s
- MusicSamplr – discover new artists and music, listen to samples
- SharedMost – what links on ANY webpage are shared most?
- Signatory – sign and date a document and verify it hasn't been altered since that exact time.
- WebTeleprompter – just what it says it is
Archives
- February 2016 (2)
- January 2016 (6)
- October 2015 (2)
- September 2015 (7)
- August 2015 (6)
- July 2015 (2)
- June 2015 (5)
- May 2015 (4)
- April 2015 (32)
- March 2015 (57)
- February 2015 (79)
- January 2015 (86)
- December 2014 (69)
- November 2014 (98)
- October 2014 (150)
- September 2014 (109)
- August 2014 (44)
- July 2014 (92)
- June 2014 (118)
- May 2014 (173)
- April 2014 (130)
- March 2014 (247)
- February 2014 (167)
- January 2014 (222)
- December 2013 (167)
- November 2013 (111)
- October 2013 (116)
- September 2013 (214)
- August 2013 (210)
- July 2013 (200)
- June 2013 (87)
- May 2013 (87)
- April 2013 (70)
- March 2013 (114)
- February 2013 (89)
- January 2013 (136)
- December 2012 (96)
- November 2012 (130)
- October 2012 (147)
- September 2012 (93)
- August 2012 (93)
- July 2012 (112)
- June 2012 (71)
- May 2012 (82)
- April 2012 (80)
- March 2012 (122)
- February 2012 (114)
- January 2012 (129)
- December 2011 (60)
- November 2011 (54)
- October 2011 (29)
- September 2011 (17)
- August 2011 (30)
- July 2011 (18)
- June 2011 (19)
- May 2011 (22)
- April 2011 (23)
- March 2011 (52)
- February 2011 (69)
- January 2011 (108)
- December 2010 (82)
- November 2010 (67)
- October 2010 (68)
- September 2010 (44)
- August 2010 (101)
- July 2010 (61)
- June 2010 (28)
- May 2010 (28)
- April 2010 (26)
- March 2010 (33)
- February 2010 (21)
- January 2010 (13)
- December 2009 (4)
- November 2009 (2)
- October 2009 (14)
- September 2009 (6)
- August 2009 (19)
- July 2009 (34)
- June 2009 (11)
- May 2009 (4)
- April 2009 (6)
- March 2009 (13)
- February 2009 (32)
- January 2009 (25)
- December 2008 (1)
- October 2008 (1)
- June 2008 (1)
- November 2007 (1)