When Vodacom wanted to give its core youth audience an‘unlimited’ experience, they knew their focus on music would be invaluable, but needed a new platform to really demonstrate the idea of ‘power to you’.
So Trinergy Brand Connectors, who had already been a vital component in the rebranding success of their client Vodacom, came to the party with a brand new concept.
“The music video space is a multi-million dollar industry, which reflects and influences the current pulse of youth culture. Seeing that Vodacom has begun playing in the music space it made strategic sense to be in this visual realm of music,” says Trinergy creative strategic director, Wandile Collis.
“But we didn’t just want to be in music activations, we wanted the brand to live music and allow music to give deeper meaning to the new brand positioning.”
Sponsorship director Nicky Scheuble explains: “ We were looking for a TV platform using music to reach our core youth audience and we needed to develop a property that would allow for complete consumer engagement and total control of the show.”
And so VideoWars was born. A first-of-its-kind experience, where viewers use a synchronised VideoWars Facebook application and mobile site to decide which music video plays next while interacting with other viewers on air as well as online.
Collis says the show cleverly allows young consumers to interact with each other and the show in their favourite forms of communication platforms – the internet (Facebook and Twitter), MMS and SMS.
At any time, four music videos from around the world will go head to head in an all-out war for television domination, vying for the votes of Channel O viewers to see which one is going to dominate LIVE on their television screens.
Vodacom Unlimited has partnered with Channel O on VideoWars. Facebook fans can log onto the Channel O Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/channelotv to vote. Also optimised for smartphones on https://videowars.mobi, it is available to users of all networks via SMS on 34086 at R1.50 per SMS.
The show advances the concept of social TV by selecting and displaying the names and profile pictures of viewers who supported the winning video and by hosting a live audience chat channel which combines Facebook, Twitter and SMS interaction on air as well as on Facebook.
VideoWars started on 1 May, and runs every Tuesday to Saturday from 15:00 till 16:00 on Channel O.
“This is a show that allows for the “Unlimited” power to choosethe next step and the final outcome of the show where consumers are ultimately able to control their entertainment in real time,” says Scheuble.
