Is Youtube's "Wii Fit Underwear Girl" Actually A Marketing Campaign?
Nintendo is facing accusations that a popular Youtube video is nothing more than a viral-video marketing campaign for the Wii Fit, reports The Telegraph. The video, quite simply, features a young woman using a virtual hula-hoop in her underwear. What separates it from other videos is that the 2 people in the video have both been identified as employees of the same advertising company. Nintendo denies the allegations. The video and details, inside...
The article says,
The clip, which has been viewed more than two million times, shows 25-year-old Lauren Bernat hula hooping in time with the fitness video game.
Rumours that the clip was a clever marketing ploy for the Wii Fit spread after it emerged that both Miss Bernat and her boyfriend, who filmed the footage, work in advertising.
Giovanny Gutierrez, 30, works as director of interactive media for Tinsley Advertising in Miami, Florida. According to his biography on the firm’s website, he "creates web, e-mail and interactive marketing solutions that perfectly integrate with television, radio and print campaigns."
"Gio is a master of e-commerce, having created web portals for scores of businesses," the biography adds.
Miss Bernat works as an account executive at Tinsley Advertising, where her duties include "evaluating the responses to our Internet advertising".
But Nintendo has denied that the footage is part of an advertising campaign. "This has and is absolutely 100 per cent nothing to do with Nintendo," a spokesman said. "Nintendo did not create it and were not aware of it until it was brought it to our attention."
Mr Gutierrez has also denied that it was a viral advert for the Wii Fit.
The game, which allows Nintendo Wii owners to do a range of exercises and stretches under the guidance of on on-screen fitness expert, hardly needs the free publicity, having sold more than 300,000 copies in the UK in its first two weeks on sale, and sold out in many parts of the world.
But the YouTube affair has done much to boost the profile of Mr Gutierrez and his agency.
The evidence that this is an organized marketing campaign seems circumstantial to us. However, advertisers are always coming up with new ways to turn attention toward new products so who knows? We'll just have to keep watching the video until we figure it out.
Wii Fit underwear girl: A marketing hoax? [The Telegraph]
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Comments:
I've decided thats a very inappropriate video...after watching it 20 times.
If it was a viral video for nintendo, there wouldn't be rock band drums in the background
But the YouTube affair has done much to boost the profile of Mr Gutierrez and his agency.
Nuff Said.
Also, I think I saw a video on Redtube or YouPorn that started out like this....
I read an interview with the guy who made it. He denied it was for Nintendo. I believe him.
danger will robinson.. malfunction...
She looks fit enough to me :)
There is one driving force for all technology. Porn. Wii fit was designed to produce things like this. Some genius realized that making a hula hoop video game in the age of YouTube would provide him with enjoyment for at least a few months.
ooo la la....
@Darascon: THANK YOU. Geeez. Common sense. We can show a blood bath on the news, but OH MY!
When she starts riding the controller, let me know. I'll create an uproar, then.
One time I was DJ'ing with my friend and we got a couple speaker dancers in front of us. One was wearing spandex hot pants with the bottoms of her cheeks exposed, and a see through blouse. This isn't as good as that.
Isn't it possible that it's just a young techno-savy guy filming his hot girlfriend shaking her very attractive assets?
And even if it is viral marketing, there is no big deal about it. Well done viral marketing pieces capture interest, and it's fun for the public to try to solve the 'mystery' of the author's intentions.
Preventative disclaimer:
For anyone who is unhappy that this video shows the hottie in her underwear, make sure you never go to the beach, where (GASP!) women wear even less. The biggest difference between the common panty and bikini swimwear is the packaging they were purchased in.
Well, first of all, if this is a marketing schtick, he's failing at his purported mission to perfectly integrate with TV, radio, etc. ads. Nintendo is too concerned with family-friendliness to be having anything like this on TV or the internet under their official sanction. Not that there's anything wrong with underwear-clad women, specifically, but we all know how the prudes make noise here.
Second, if the goal was to make you want some of that action yourself, he could have picked a much more attractive woman.
@heavylee-again: I agree. Never ever have I been able to understand why this society finds it perfectly acceptable to trot around in tiny scraps on the beach or at the pool - but identically shaped and placed tiny scraps, in similarly opaque (or not, in some swimsuits and lengerie...) fabrics are considered indecent exposure elsewhere.
I dont understand what happened this week to add to the story. News broke, and the connection between the marketing company and the video, approx 3 weeks ago. Ive seen this pop up on 4-5 sites this weekend for some reason.
I feel so alone in this world because I thought it was an obvious viral advertisement. It's the hot thing to do right now as it gets the most attention, such as it is now.
Viral advertising makes me do the opposite of what they are trying to accomplish though.
Im with Darascon
donkeyjote : that is the stupidist things ever, and the fact shes ripping on something stupid is terrible and esp the fact she did it herself
lol
Dude? Who cares? Over at Kotaku we've been discussing this for at least a week. Nobody seems to care about the fact about the Wii Fit, but it's more about that attractive woman in the photo.
A librarian is angry about it because it defames her.
[kotaku.com]
@heavylee-again: Also, the common panty doesn't repel water.
@Pasketti: I hadn't even heard of the video until now and I admit I couldn't figure out how this would sell more Wii Fits. According to the article you linked to the video's real title is "Why every guy should buy his girlfriend a Wii Fit".
Wouldn't a guy buying his girlfriend a Wii Fit be a rather expensive way of calling her fat?
I feel bad for the librarian but really any employer too stupid to think that there are multiple people with the same name is probably too stupid to work for.
I watched it once and was like, "Eh, that's trashy." Doesn't really do it for me. Am I the only one?
@Rectilinear Propagation: No, more like a rather inexpensive way of saying "I would buy you a pole so you could dance around in ne'rnothings for me, but then you would think I was a cad"
@donkeyjote: I would have thought that exercising in sweatpants would be like the opposite of pole dancing.
I learn something new everyday.
Ok, I am a hiney worshiper and LOVE that Lauren Bernat video. Real or fake, a butt & leg fan like me can appreciate that.
Does it make me want to buy a Wii? NO.
yeah, because advertising agencies use there employees and actors all the time. Seriously guys?
sorry but how is this a 'hoax'?!
@jdlyga: Touche! I smell Miami ad Douchebag wants to film his girlfriend in her underwear AND boost his profile, hence the douchebag part.
ok i wanted a wii before this. and i'm actually all for creative advertising. at this point in america, they just show us the product and expect us to buy it and for the most part it works. if marketers had to put some sort of effort into selling us shit i might be more inclined to pay attention to ehri ads in the first place. at least make it entertaining if you're going to make it impossible to avoid with a full withdrawl from society.
If it was, good on them. If it wasn't, so what? Either way people get to watch a cutie in her undies exercise.
Viral is going to be the next big ad campaign area - why are we surprised?
*their
wtf brain?
@Kevino: "Viral advertising makes me do the opposite of what they are trying to accomplish though."
Completely 100% agree. Most advertising does that to me.
@katylostherart: "if marketers had to put some sort of effort into selling us shit i might be more inclined to pay attention to ehri ads in the first place"
I agree... but I want advertising to admit it is advertising, even if it is very well done.
@Ayo: Another excellent point. What ad agency would ever, EVER ask an employee to do that? And then not expect to get sued. OR, what AE would ever ever suggest HERSELF to use a product in her underwear and put it on the web.
I'm not so appaled that this girl is in her underwear, I mean aside from Battlestar Galactica fans, who hasn't seen that?
I am more annoyed that this douchebag put this out there as either a 'viral' ad campaign -which I detest, or for self-promotion (attention whoring).
OK seriously. This is neither self promotion nor viral. Just because someone works in advertising doesn't mean everything they do is an advertisement. Don't be ridiculous.
I work in interactive advertising. Does that mean every time I post a clip of my standup that involves a joke about Dateline NBC that that's a viral piece for dateline?!
Yeah I have to call "unlikely" on the potential that this is a add. I think Nintendo is much too focussed on the "Family" side of gaming to put out something like this.
Well of course theyre going to lie about it. It becomes 100% less cool when you find out they were paid to make a viral ad. You're just mad cause you all got played
how much is a wii again? my girlfriend uses real hula hoops. i think they are about a dollar each. great use of technology.
@edicius: Not trashy, exactly, but it does make me wonder about Ms. Bernat's common sense. She's ostensibly an executive (granted, title inflation has rendered this term practically meaningless); that is, a professional, and posting an identifiable video of herself doing the hula in her underwear is pretty borderline. A more conservative boss might see it as fireable.
dude needs to get his eyebrows waxed.
At least they had the good taste not to post a vid of her doing the downward dog.
I wanna know who was the guy that identified her from that angle.
@Superawesomerad: A more conservative boss might see it as fireable.
I think it is almost always inappropriate for a person to be fired for an off-the-clock activity that makes one 'wonder about a person's common sense' as you put it. As long as it's not illegal, almost without exception there should be no link between a person's private life and their professional career.
However, I understand that everyone does not always agree with me. I'm still working on that.... :)
@heavylee-again: I've worked in HR, and I've seen people fired over less than this. You may not agree with it (I don't, not always) but that's the way it works at some companies. If you post shit that could potentially be seen as reflecting poorly on you and/or your employer, you're putting yourself in an unnecessarily precarious position. Every new employee orientation I've been to recently warns about this. That's why I called the woman's common sense into question.
"[T]here should be no link between a person's private life and their professional career." Yeah, well, it's not exactly private if you post it on YouTube where it gets viewed over 2 million times.
Nope, not for nintendo. Like the other commenter said, Rock band in the back ground, plus nintendo = family oriented, this is not exactly a family oriented ad. Although the guy works for the company that is supposed to be advertising the wii fit, I don't think this was supposed to be a viral marketing campaign.
More likely they got one to take home to test/come up with ideas, and the girlfriend hopped on one morning, and voila...
Gotta give him credit though, all this free publicity probably helps his cause, I mean who even heard of this guy before this thing hit youtube? Not me.
I loved the DNA art on his wall. Wait what was the point of the video again?
Does it matter? Nintendo says it wasn't. They say it wasn't. Who the F cares? I mean really why do we have to waste all this time over some ass jiggling in underoos? It's not like anyone was under age or nekkid. People need to build a bridge and get the F over it.