Virgin’s latest Australian campaign got me thinking about consumer-generated advertising again.

All to often, consumer-generated campaigns have been in the form of contests where brands request film/photo submissions from consumers, and then pick winners from that pool. This greatly limits the amount of work to choose from, while attracting a mostly ancillary target: aspiring creative directors (or film directors, photographers, etc.) – not the brand evangelists that we assume are just itching for the chance to tell the world why they love the brand that gas urged them to spill their heart out.

Virgin pursued a smarter strategy for an outdoor campaign. They mined Flickr for amateur work, and picked some great photos taken by people who never intended to make billboards. There are several benefits to doing this:
1. Huge universe of work to choose from
2. The original photos are honest and pure – never intended for advertising
3. Opportunity to build tremendous goodwill by rewarding unsuspecting photographers

They seem to have bungled the whole “contacting the winners” bit (and have since reached out), but the premise is spot on: the best consumer-generated work (e.g., advertising, word-of-mouth) is typically done when the consumer’s hand isn’t forced. Virgin did it one way. Another is to take advantage when it happens organically.

Props to the MIT Adverlab for putting me on to the story.