Elf Yourself
I was looking up some information on The Funded on Alexa yesterday and came across a chart that showed Elf Yourself was on fire. So I did some comparisons to see exactly how much traffic Elf Yourself has.
If this Alexa chart is correct, then Elf Yourself is one of the top 100 Internet properties this month, close to Bebo and Answers.com in traffic. That is pretty amazing. Elf Yourself is essentially a holiday advertising campaign for Office Max.
Our portfolio company Oddcast did one of these avatar-based promotions called Monkey Mail for Career Builder. By the time Monkey Mail had run its course, something like 75 million people had engaged with a Monkey Mail. When these things catch fire, they work. Compare the cost of doing one of these flash based interactions versus the cost of a 30 second TV commercial. And then compare the cost of buying enough media to reach 75 million viewers vs putting up a viral website. Expect to see more of this kind of advertising in the future.
Here’s my Elf Yourself in case you want to see my avatar dancing in an elf suit. Too bad they don’t have embed code.
Comments (Archived):
Sure, these types of sites are incredibly viral – just the other night my wife called me over and there was our son’s head dancing around.But don’t people just use these things once, tell a friend, and never return? What’s the call to action besides spreading elves? Are there any statistics that show a clear link between interacting with a property and increased sales?
Hey Fred – It’s Gregg at JibJab.Check out the Starring You! video we are doing with Pepsi. The pre-roll actually features the user who uploaded a head…http://www.jibjab.com/senda…We’re not showing the traffic on Alexa for some reason (there is usually a lag) but you can see it on Quantcast: http://www.quantcast.com/ji…In the first week out of the gate we did more streams for the Pepsi sponsored content than the #1 comedy video on YouTube. It’s a very exciting time to be playing in the world of branded entertainment.Happy holidays!
You’re talking through your chin, but it’s still very cute.
I received one of these last year and it was so catchy I sent it on to my family and friends and they also thought it incredible fun. I thought I was not taken with it but unconsciously I found myself choosing Office Max over my other options. When I finally thought about it, I was in fact “repaying” the joy they had given my folks. It works! Even if consumers are not completely cognizant of it.
It can backfire though. Obviously they are not set up for the volume of hits and a lot of people get stuck during the process and then have to start all over again. I am on my fourth day/countless attempt, because the children really want to send it to the grandparents. So this little gimmick might make somebody choose Staples over Office Max – since the latter will be associated with endless waiting 🙂
I believe the stat. There are tons of people using ElfYourself. In fact, I came across this site with Bush dancing in a funny Elf outfit. Worth checking it out: http://wikigiz.com/2007/12/…
The I.T. guy at the company I work for is claiming that the link to an elf yourself that I posted on the company intranet is causing us to get a ton of new spam. I don’t get it. It is just a link & elfyourself did not even.ask me for an email address. I think that he is just upset at how funny he looks as an elf and made this up so that I would have to pull it. Is the anybody who has had any problems with spam due to elf yourself ? Or anybody who can confirm that what he is saying is nonsense?Thanks
its a pity the site is down this christmas!!
Das Some Funny Sheit
This is a great way to get some cheap publicity!
This is a great way to get some free publicity!
nob
this is stupid!!!!!! when can you make an EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLFFFFFFFFFFF
I for one and all of my friends enjoyed elfyourself immensely….. but would still never dream of using officemax!!!
Advertising always works if it’s funny & clever. And the more it is, the more it works. But haven’t we always known this ? The lesson of the Elf is that the immense viral potential of the web is still being vastly uderestimated.
i think elf yourself is the coolest thing ever 🙂
cool =)