Go Daddy’s Crowdsourcing Sequel
Image: The Go Daddy Group
Earlier this year Go Daddy crowdsourced a “Create Your Own Commercial” contest that generated hundreds of submissions by customers, fans and creatives. The top eight videos split $250,000 in prize money. Not bad.
The company looks to keep a good thing going with the “Go Daddy Commercial Contest: Summer Edition,” and expects the sequel to be a blockbuster. Continuing the project speaks well to crowdsourcing’s value.
Go Daddy stands to again benefit from a slew of new user-generated commercials containing creative ideas the company itself probably would not have come up with on its own - the beauty of innovation and collaboration that is crowdsourcing.
The company has committed at least $500,000 in prize money, so a fair investment is involved yet the volume of submissions is likely to be in the hundreds and return on award cash in terms of creative options, production value, social networking and web traffic could liken the half-million price tag to a Kmart blue light special.
Participants get an even bigger piece of the action too this time around. The grand prize is $250,000, the runner up will take home $150,000 and third prize will claim $75,000. Any entries worthy of honorable mention will be awarded $25,000 for their time, and the incentives keep coming. A “campaign bonus” of $100,000 is available for a contestant who submits three or more themed ads Go Daddy takes a shine to.
While fan-based advertising submissions are nothing new, I can appreciate that Go Daddy isn’t being lazy monetarily in order to encourage engagement and creativity. The company isn’t shy about asking professional agencies to compete either. RedTie Productions won the first contest with an entry title “Go Momma.”
Marianne Curran, executive vice president of media and communications for Go Daddy, answered some questions for me recently about her company’s crowdsourced marketing mindset.
RZ: What was the catalyst for Go Daddy’s video contests?
MC: We’re always looking for new ways to get our message out. Since we often hear from our customers about our ads, we decided to engage them via the social community. We’re looking for people who can translate their passion for our products into advertising suggestions. We came up the contest idea and once we launched it took off.
RZ: What benefits did you anticipate from crowdsourcing commercials?
MC: We launched the contest during the Super Bowl earlier this year and it exceeded our expectations. We had hundreds of submissions with about 500 entries making the cut for judging. The social chatter, ideas shared and online community voting alone have made the project valuable. The videos have been great for sharing on social networks. One video has had over 80,000 views on our website and more than 175,00 views on YouTube.
We’ve also used some of the top clips from the original contest in our national broadcast media schedule.
RZ: Any key learnings thus far?
MC: Listening to and collaborating with the social community is key throughout the process. When the challenge went out for the first contest our community told us that increasing the prizes would generate more interest and greater quality entries. We took their suggestion. Bob Parsons, our CEO, added additional winners including five honorable mention awards that were $15,000 each for the first contest. Overall, the contests have allowed us to have back-and-forth dialog with some of our most passionate customers who’ve been able to contribute to a well-known brand image and add their creative interpretation to our advertising messages.
Videos from the first Go Daddy contest can be viewed here, and go-getters interested in throwing their hat in the ring for the current contest can find details at www.GoDaddy.com/Contest.
Will a fan-produced commercial get the Go Daddy treatment for next year’s Super Bowl. Only time will tell. Meanwhile, Go Bears!
(Go Daddy also appears in my August “Digital Dialogue” column for the Public Relations Society of America’s Tactics journal.)
