When Blendtec’s back was against the wall and they were struggling financially, they decided to take to the Internet for an inexpensive and creative means of publicity. The CEO of this highly durable blender company witnessed Tom Dickson grinding up a 2×2 hunk of wood, as a part of a durability test, and he came up with the idea: Will It Blend?
Since 2008, Tom Dickson has become one of the most watched people on Youtube.com. He has ground up super glue, Justin Bieber figurines, a skeleton and even an iPad. His nerdy persona, mixed with ridiculous puns and the hilarity of watching expensive and durable items being destroyed, was a recipe for an Internet success. I mean, who could turn their head away from someone grinding up a gun in a blender?
Now, as I have scrolled through the comments on many of the “Will It Blend” videos, I have noticed negative comments, usually stating things like “Why are you destroying these things? Less fortunate people out there could use them.” These viewers need to realize that many corporate-level advertisements and campaigns cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. To make these videos, it costs Blendtec the price of whatever items they are destroying. That’s about it. And trust me, the return on these “ads” have been phenomenal.
These blenders are not cheap. They cost about $400 each, but when these videos went viral, it substantially spiked sales of Blendtec’s blenders. In 2008, sales were up 500%. In 2009, sales were up 700%. Each video has an average of a million views, with a few of them skewing this average with 7,000,000 or more views. People have even gone onto eBay to purchase the items that were ground up, including the dust of an iPhone.
Blendtec’s “Will It Blend” videos are a great example of a social media marketing success. They had a good product and they knew it, but they needed to create a buzz for it somehow. Why not tap in to the Youtube audience and gets some incredibly cheap publicity? They did this effectively and made one heck of a living, not only off of selling blenders, but also with YouTube ad revenue.