Goafest 2012: “You don’t have to be big to build trust for your brand through video”: Lucas Watson, YouTube

Starting off with the ‘Life In A Day’ film by Ridley Scott, Lucas Watson, vice president of global sales and industry marketing, YouTube, spoke about how a project like that would not have been possible 10 years ago.

Some of the other cases that Watson showed were:

Lady Gaga for Google Chrome

Watson said, “Lady Gaga has an amazing sense of how to build communities, and she is one with the people she serves. Her fans are a passionate group who participate with her to create her brand.” He added that the best brand leaders today are thinking about how they build their brand with a lot of people rather than speaking to the people. YouTube enables the trend, he said.

P&G ‘Thank you, mom’

Watson said, “P&G has taken an old idea, and been studying and honing it to see how to make it take off for the Summer Olympics. The new ad came out a week ago, and is built through internet and web. People are discovering it naturally, and is designed with the intent of people joining into the movement of the campaign.”

Dollarshaveclub.com

Watson said, “Three months ago, the company didn’t exist. It launched with a video on YouTube, and with TrueView they only had to pay when a person watched the ad. If you think about TV advertising, being the domain of the Coca-Colas, McDonald’s and Airtels, the internet offers an opportunity for a lot of peoplein the SME business space. Four million people have seen this ad. Gillette has announced a price cut at P&G because of it. That’s how fast you can make something happen when you strike a chord. You don’t have to be big to build trust for your brand through video.”

In the Q&A session, N Rajaram, chief marketing officer – consumer business, Bharti Airtel, asked about whether the role of ad agencies changing dramatically. Watson replied, “Being creative and coming up with ideas is a skill. The CD is not the only one with great ideas, the role of the CD needs to evolve from coming up with ideas themselves to unlocking the power of internet for ideas.”

Do people at TV channels need to be worried, asked Rajaram, if video advertising takes off. Watson said, “The industry is going through transformation and disruption. There are media properties coming up from the web first. The mosaic of portfolio of TV channels will be a mix of old and new. The collective will be better than anything you’ve had before. So there will be co-existence, but there will be winners and losers.”

Finally, asked if someone can start with the objective of making a viral video, Watson said, “If the objective  is to create a viral video, you’ll probably never create it. If the objective is to unlock hearts and minds with effort of serving people, then the brand has a chance” In a lighter vein, he added, “If you have a baby or dog, or a mom as in the case of P&G, it works everytime. I guess they are often associated with bonds between people and are universal in their relevance.”