Agency.com - Viral Marketing Controversy

Viral Marketing Controversy

A 2006 ad campaign by Agency.com involved an experimental "viral" pitch video for the Subway (restaurant) account uploaded onto YouTube.com. The purpose of the pitch video upload appears to have been an attempt to show Agency.com's online innovation to Subway by including a "viral" component in the pitch by documenting the pitch process itself and uploading it for all the world to see, discuss, and pass around. The term, "When we roll, we roll big" was used by an Agency.com employee in the video.

Judged by comments posted on industry blogs like AdRants, AdWeek Magazine's AdFreak, Leo Burnett's Fruits of Imagination and Iain Tait's Crackunit.com the vast majority of industry response to Agency.com’s tactic has been overwhelmingly negative. Many comments on YouTube have also noted that the positive comments that were made by YouTube members who have had accounts that, in many cases, were just hours old, adding to suspicion that the positive “buzz” on the YouTube site was merely Agency.com employees patting themselves on their virtual backs.