Yesterday Organic was buzzing about a new "viral" piece. Agency.com uploaded a video to YouTube as part of their pitch for Subway restaurant’s business. It was a brave attempt to show their team and their process to a prospective
client by utilizing an au courant marketing technology.
While some questioned the style or worried that some of the
content may not have reflected so positively on Agency.com (hostile questioning, no customer insights, the team’s lack of diversity, self-indulgent length), all gave high
marks for trying something new and for the guts to be so
transparent. As one Organic put it, "they get an A for innovation, and an F for content".
By contrast, the blogosphere has been pretty savage. AdRants calls it "painful to watch" (and the insults build from there), Media Bistro says it’s "a nine minute reminder of why you didn’t go into advertising", AdFreak reports that the ironic unofficial T-shirts designs are already up.
No question that it got people talking.
Comments
Connections
“Subway has just launched a new sub called “The Agency.com.” It’s a super-sized sandwich with no meat, but lots of cheese. It takes you 9 minutes to eat it and then you throw up.”
Nuff said!
This remix is worthwhile as well:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cE0SsmAWI5k
It may be inadvertently viral, but it sure makes them look like condescending weasels- especially the part where the Actual Subway Delivery Guy shows up… I guess they don’t have a subway in Westport, do they?
Well, I actually gave them two thumbs up on my blog, although the 23 comments I got were a bit of a mixed bag.
My fav comment was:
“Let’s agree that it’s not a positive if 20,000 people watch something and 18,000 of them decide you’re a bunch of total wankers”
Certainly seems like the consensus was A for effort F for execution.
I personally think that social media turns a lot of interactive agency business models on their heads and Agency.com did this because their business is in trouble as opposed to “wanting to be innovative”.
I have written a follow up called Five Implications for the social media agency that I would be interested in your perspective on as an interactive agency.
Cheers,
Karl