In August this year it hit the 1 million subscriber mark for its YouTube channel, with individual videos receiving view tallies well over 20 million each.

It made the current Bloomberg Business Week “Popularity Issue” as the Top Web Series. And it was recently discovered by my family during our annual beach vacation. Ugh! Why the ugh? It’s the Annoying Orange.

And it’s exactly that. Annoying Orange is the wisecracking, purposely irritating punster who stars in his own YouTube web series.

The videos feature a real orange with superimposed human eyes and lips.  The plot line for each video is simple: Annoying Orange meets his episode’s co-star(s): another fruit, vegetable, object, or even other YouTube “celebs.”  Annoying Orange tells jokes, laughs a lot, makes fun of and annoys the co-star, who ends up being eliminated, whether it’s by knife (the demise of most fruits and veggies), or by some other physical comedy.

Having had to listen to and/or watch the videos again and again during my vacation, and looking to make lemons out of lemonade (or orange juice out of oranges), the videos got me thinking about what’s making this series so amazingly popular, and what marketers can learn from it in attracting an audience.

It’s simple, basic, and consistently updated – Seriously, no big budgets here.  It’s just a talking orange with a little bit of editing magic and other household props.  The plot lines are mindless, easy for anyone of any age to get, and pure shtick.  And the videos are refreshed every Friday – a good reason to subscribe and/or return to the site.

It’s quick – The videos are less than three minutes each.  No attention span needed.  A great video “snack” for anyone surfing through YouTube. It’s appropriate for the channel – According to eMarketer, videos shot by consumers and uploaded to YouTube (i.e., user generated) are the most frequently watched type of online video.  (May 2010 stat)

It leverages partners – A few of the videos feature other YouTube “celebs” as the targets of Annoying Orange’s antics.  At the end, you can click and go to these stars’ specific YouTube channels.  It’s an interesting means of cross-selling these “brands” within the YouTube community.

It has lots of engagement opportunities – The Annoying Orange YouTube channel features, and each of the videos end with, lots and lots of engagement opportunities.  Calls to action include: follow on Twitter, Facebook, answer a question relevant to the video in the comments section, buy a shirt, download a ringtone, subscribe to the channel, or just click to watch another episode.  Annoying Orange truly is its own brand looking for ongoing loyalty.

Now, I’m not suggesting that marketers use third-grade boy level jokes, bodily function noises, nor any type of produce in their creative approaches in order to achieve success.  Rather, Annoying Orange is an interesting case in how to deliver content and sell a brand, without letting a consumer know that you’re really selling a brand.  It’s the right content, in the proper amount, delivered in the perfect channel, and given support, ongoing attention, and engagement opportunities that make it work.

Interesting to note that despite its popularity, very little has been written about the Annoying Orange.  CNN.com – one of the few press sites that has picked it up – said that the current Nabisco Cheez-Its “Mature Cheese” is probably the closest creative rip-off of the series.

Hey…hey reader.  Hey reader.  Orange you glad I shared these insights?  *rimshot*  Ugh.

To give back to the web-development community, we are proud to sponsor Flash and the City. The brainchild of our web-dev leader Elad Elrom, this four-day, out-of-the-box conference will bring the Flash community from around the world together in New York City and redefine the way we share and marry artistic creativity with technological ingenuity.

To get an inside scoop on Flash and the City, we probed Elad with some questions:

1.  How did you come up with the idea of a Flash and the City conference?
Over the last few years I noticed that there haven’t been any large conferences in New York City. I have spoken to numerous people, from community leaders to Adobe’s evangelists. For the last couple of years, Adobe MAX has been in California, and there has been a real void for many professionals in New York City who would like to have a conference that allows them to be part of the Flash community. Additionally, I have noticed that in general many of the conferences are geared toward learning but do not have enough networking events. Flash and the City’s goal is to redefine the way we think about conferences as well as to unite A-list speakers with professionals in New York and other attendees from around the world.

2.  What are you most excited to hear next week?
Announcements during the keynote from our sponsors such as Litl and Adobe. Also some of the presentations that will be shown for the very first time during the conference.

I am excited about the venue as well. Instead of using a traditional hotel, we will be hosting the conference in an artist’s theater called 3LD (3-Legged Dog). 3LD is a technology center located in downtown Manhattan and is a thriving catalyst in the New York art scene. By hosting the conference in 3LD we will be supporting the artists.

3.  What are the top three things you want FATC attendees to leave with?
Networking
Attendees will have access to the City Track. The City Track is a completely new conference format, and the extracurricular activities will include a New York cruise and dinner, the rock/grunge band 22nd Century, and tours around New York City. I believe networking is one of the most important aspects of a conference; so networking with peers from the Flash community can only help our attendees’ careers.

Knowledge
Flash and the City is similar to other conferences in that attendees will get great value in terms of learning. They will receive two tracks for three days, and they can register for a workshop being held the day before the conference. In fact, attendees will have a chance to hear presentations from 50 speakers. These speakers are mind-blowing presenters that have made significant impacts on technology.

Inspiration
Attending the conference will gain attendees some insight of what’s being developed, what’s hot, what the trends are as well as the technologies that are worth learning.

4.  What is the new noise/buzz you hope will be created by the Flash community during FATC?
I think that now more than ever the Flash community needs to be united and show that Flash isn’t dead at all, and in reality we are creating exciting and amazing applications on many devices. FATC will show just that and allow the Flash community to have fun talking about technology and seeing what everyone is up to these days.

5.  How can people follow the conference?
Website: FlashAndTheCity.com
Blog: Blog.FlashAndTheCity.com
Twitter Account:  @flashandthecity
Twitter Hashtag:  #FATC

Highlights from the conference will also be posted here on the Sigma blog.  Stay tuned!

A great example of the contradictions in behavior is with food.  Look at the landscape in recent, food headlines and news bytes (no pun intended).  And then take a peek at what’s tantalizing our pallets as trends and recent intros.  The juxtaposition not only demonstrates consumers’ contradictions in choices, but at its core, it reveals consumers’ desire to be surprised, delighted, and to just walk away feeling happy. Check out this “salty and sweet mash-up” of sorts…

Headline: “Food Safety Leaders:  Kraft, Subway, Starbucks to Cut Salt.” Both restaurants and packaged food companies are signing up for the challenge of reducing sodium in their products by 20% over the next five years.

But then there’s:  Bacon cupcakes.  Bacon lip balm.  Bacon marmalade. Bacon vodka. Bacon ice cream.  Bacon bacon.  It’s one of the top food and flavor trends cited for 2010 and if you don’t believe us, just check how two ‘Bacontrepreneurs’ from Bacon Salt grew an enterprise in three years with a $5,000 loan from a 3-year old.

Headline: “For Corn Syrup, the Sweet Talk Gets Harder.”
What started as a narrow movement by proponents of natural and organic foods has morphed into a swell of mainstream opposition.

But then there’s:  The recently revealed, million-dollar winning recipe in this year’s Pillsbury bakeoff:  the Mini Ice-Cream Cookie Cup, which included pre-made refrigerated sugar cookie dough, ice cream, melted chocolate, and raspberry jam.  It won because it was simple and it just tasted good.

Headline:  “Santa Clara Bans Happy Meal Toys.” This proposal is believed to be the first of this type, and would ban the inclusion of a toy in any kids meal with more than 485 calories, 600 mg of salt, or high amounts of sugar or fat.

But then there’s:  KFC’s new Double Down Sandwich.  Two fried chicken filets, two kinds of cheese, and (yes) bacon.  (Apparently, adult consent = OK)

All rational reasons that are making headlines—yet consumers’ emotional sides being fulfilled in trends and new food choices.

As marketers of food and non-food brands we realize that the new normal in spending is driven by careful consideration and prioritization:
•    88% of consumers have taken steps in 2010 to reduce spending overall
•    93% say that their spending has become more strategic

But at the same time, 90% of consumers are seeking small treats for themselves, as well as others, in what they buy.   Why?  Because small treats feel good.  And it’s that “small treats” insight that points us to the emotional connections a brand can bring to the table.  Whether it’s added value, or undeniable proof that only your product can do the job, or a free sample, or stellar customer service, or just a great online experience.   Delivering small treats that satisfy is like a consumer magnet!

Turkey bacon.  I think that’s a good way to visualize the happy medium tempering the rational needs with the emotional wants.  It’ll be our ongoing challenge to find a turkey bacon like balance in every marketing recommendation.

(Source: Coming of Age in the Great Recession: A Grounded Consumer Followup, Carton Donofrio Partners, Context-Based Research Group)

Why is it then, that we fail to act when we think—sometimes even know— that our brand is in disrepair? Well, whether it’s an abandoned Buick on the side of the road, or a brand new Prius with a sticky accelerator, there are identifiable indicators that it’s time to make a visit to “the brand shop”. The following are a few things that may light up your brand’s dashboard:

1.  Your market environment has changed. Your customers’ expectations of how a brand in your space looks, means, and behaves has altered. Are you keeping up with it? What your brand offers is still relevant to your customers, but how they think of you (and talk about you) needs to change to allow you to be more competitive.

2.  Your organization is transforming. You may have identified a new line of business, or adopted a new model, new markets may have emerged—your brand has to evolve with these changes, right down to its fundamentals. While you are not remotely a start-up, in many respects you need to act like one. You must carefully identify the perfect positioning, employ the right strategies and develop new messages and digital properties that are in sync with your transformation.

3.  Your competition is more aggressively managing its brand to better connect with your customers and prospects. If someone in your category is creating a lot of buzz, inspiring messaging and visual expression. You need to react before it’s too late. They say in the next five years there will be more change than there were in the last fifty. If your brand foundation and products are sound, you should be able to adapt and manage any change.

4.  Your communications—print, video and digital—just don’t reflect your brand position. If you’re on top of your offerings and operations, but find yourself apologizing for every brochure and URL you hand out, then it’s time to take a new look at how you express yourself visually. There have never been more tools available to you to refresh your brand.

5.  You took a wrong direction. A lot of things can lead us down the wrong path: Misinterpreted research, aggressive purchasing, even a shift in the market. Or maybe you just took a gamble.  At any rate, your brand is currently out of sync with the direction your industry is taking—or more importantly what your customers are wanting. A brand course correction is needed.

6.  Your brand has changed, but the perception hasn’t. Your products/services are in the forefront – you offer great innovations, higher quality and greater value to your customers. But they’re just not getting it. You need to eliminate this lag and allow your company to move forward. The good news is that you have the vision, model and value to fuel new messages, a new visual expression and a brand that will advance your evolved organization.

Once you have identified your ‘flashing sign’, understanding what course you need to take to transform your brand will go a long way towards ensuring the work you undertake will be necessary and effective.  A good full service ‘brand shop’ should help you better understand what’s wrong (diagnostic), what it will take to get you from here to there (planning), which experience will take you to your destination (creative), and how to continuously stay on the right track (stewardship/optimization).

So what’s grabbing consumers’ attention and share of wallet?

•    Known Equities – Line extensions and slight variations in products made consumers feel comfortable with their choices, for example, Campbell’s Select Harvest was #1, selling $201.8 million in better-for-you soup.

•    Feeling Good – Self care is on the rise, as consumers seek product solutions that help them avoid doctors and other professionals. And really, just stay happy!  Feel good new products helped meet this need, through healthy, functional foods such as Green Giant Valley Fresh Steamers frozen veggies or Kellogg’s FiberPlus – which are granola bars with high fiber, multiple vitamins, and antioxidants.  Or just feel-good-fun from products like Dreyer’s/Edy’s Fun Flavors ice creams and sorbets like Double Fudge Brownie, Butter Pecan, and Cookie Dough…(yum!) or Bud Light Lime.

•    Better, Easier, Convenient, More Effective brought to you through Technology – Particularly among non-food, top performers, if a consumer could get and do more thanks to technology, they bought it.  From three-ply toilet paper (Quilted Northern Ultra Plush at #1 in non-foods, $134.8 million) to multi-tasking laundry detergent  (Tide TotalCare) to deodorant that releases as you move (Secret Flawless).

•    Value & Brand Experience – A common theme we’ve all heard again and again is how today’s consumers are seeking best values.  Not just in pricing, but as a total picture of what they’re getting for their money.  Successful new products delivered more than just a solution – they offered extras like recyclable packaging, professional grade formulas, in-home sensory experiences, and highly targeted benefits.

IRI’s entire white paper report is free to download and a worthwhile few minutes of your time.   It shares the lists of pacesetters mentioned and others, as well as rising star products, and trends to watch in 2010.

Whether you’re lucky enough to have a brand new product launch, or just need to infuse a little news into your existing brand, tapping into consumers’ hot buttons and what’s grabbing their basket rings are good places for a brief to begin!

On March 2nd Sigma Group’s Team Hercules proudly partnered with Read Across America.  We gladly celebrated the birthday of beloved children’s author Dr. Seuss by reading to several groups of children at the YMCA of Greater Bergen County.

Dana, our Associate Media Director, said it best when she noted her favorite part was, “Captivating the children’s attention and taking their imaginations for a wild ride through storytelling.”  With Dana manning the ship the children were indeed treated to quite a ride.  She spent over an hour reading story after story to a group of three-year-olds who sat with wide eyes and open mouths through it all.  Dana provided a voice for each character in her story and with an animation that rivaled even the most dramatic Disney character.

For Joanna, our Account Director, it was being able to share three of her own children’s favorite stories with new smiling faces that gave her the most joy.  This also provided Joanna with an experience that she could share with her own children about her day that they could easily relate to.

For me the best part was not only seeing the joy that we were able to bring to the children but also the joy the children brought to all of our participants. It was a win-win experience that created an energizing natural high that lasted all day long! It certainly was time well spent.

This is one of the many ways Sigma Group and Team Hercules are “making it matter.”  We feel that allowing employees to enrich their day by focusing on a cause with purpose rather than profit provides our communities with a commodity they can cash in.

Read Across America is an initiative that requires so little time and resources that there really is no negative to this program.

Can you imagine waking up one day to discover that your capacity to take in new knowledge has ended?  That everything you are going to learn has already happened and that your brain, now filled to capacity, was blinking “hard drive full”?  It can happen.  I have experienced it.

One thing that occurs when you are the custodian of a marketing budget is that everyone wants to meet with you.  If you allowed every new vendor to come in for a pitch, you could literally spend every day watching Power Point slides.  To better manage your time you set up protocols and processes–your staff and agencies screen new opportunities and vendors and only highlight those that they feel are right and likely to interest you.  This frees you up to focus on running your marketing programs, driving your business, and managing your time.

But all those protocols and layers are traps.  They isolate you from the marketplace and insulate you from innovation.  Your ability to compare and make decisions on new opportunities based on your firsthand knowledge/exposure diminishes… you are going stale.  So what can you do to stay current and in-touch with new options and changing landscapes without being capsized by solicitation?  Here are some fuel for thought suggestions:

• Trends/Data/Marketing News
• Brands on Twitter
• Marketing & Advertising

Interruption-based mass marketing that simply shouts messages one way to customers is not only one of the most ineffective strategies for today’s landscape, it’s also a red flag when it comes to building your brand’s image, reputation and value. To us, the smartest brands are now listening to the conversations their customers are having, watching where they are taking place and engaging with them on an individual level to add value in real time. Even better, an increasing number of marketers are not only deploying programs specifically created for the social platforms, they’re strategically harnessing insights from the data and using them to help plan and develop stronger brand positioning and marketing programs in the future.

From a marketer’s standpoint (especially those that fall into the challenger brand status), last year was about how to make your business run harder and faster in a bid to stay competitive in a downturn. In 2010, we at Sigma believe it’s going to be about proving value through both your consumer conversation quotient and the product experience. Brand value will be influenced more and more by the consumer, making it more important than ever for brands to deploy programs that are authentic and conversation-worthy. For challenger brands, this is going to aid in brand differentiation and consumer engagement. Differentiation needs to be bigger than just a brand name. True differentiation will come from consumer engagement strategies and a brand’s willingness to involve customers. Visibility and opportunity await the brand that is best at engaging their customer as well as making the product experience richer and better than the rest.

Last year, we worked with clients in footwear, burn care, technology and professional services, helping them embrace new marketing approaches fueled by the changing landscape. Fostering brand advocates and evangelists is not just for brands in the consumer space. It’s everywhere, and it applies to both consumer and B2B brands alike. As the new year kicks off and while writing your marketing game plan, ask yourself: Are you equipped in 2010 for true differentiation?

Related posts:
All Media Is Social. Now What? by Fuel for Thought

John Battelle & The Conversation Economy by C. B. Whittemore

We’ll kick-off the first conference recap with John Battelle’s (CEO/Founder, Federated Media) keynote on “All Media is Social.  Now What?”  John’s keynote was brilliantly right-on-topic to get us all kindling new ideas.  Here are four key areas he covered:

1.  The Rise of Conversational Marketing: First we declared our intentions (what we want) through search.  Then we declared our relations (social graph — who we are as defined by how we are connected to other people) on sites like Facebook.  Finally, during the past year we declared our utterances (what we are doing, what we are interested in, etc.) on sites like Twitter.  When you put all these declarations together — intention, relations and utterances, you have an economy of conversations.

2.  Conversation Economy: Every marketer is a publisher and every publisher is a marketer.  And every consumer is both.  What was once a one-way conversation has now become a two-way conversation. To succeed as marketers, we must leverage appropriate digital media and have conversations with customers at scale.  If you believe conversational marketing is real, we have to contemplate how we can best market in that native environment.  It’s a new form of exchange between numerous participants, and we as marketers are one of those participants representing the brand.  We are still in an early stage and we have to learn new skills by trying and relentlessly testing.

3.  What Brands Need to Succeed in Conversational Marketing: Marketing must become everyone’s job and it must become a horizontal practice rather than a vertical specialty.  This means rethinking from the top down and the bottom up.  To succeed in the Social Media, brands need the same things that are required in a Packaged Goods environment.

Scale + Safety + Quality + Engagement

4.  Conversational Marketing Guidelines:  Fuel for Thought tips and suggestions include:
-  Find conversations you want to join or start
-  Find the natural leaders of those conversations
-  Listen first, then join
-  Add value to the conversations
-  Make media annuities

To hear more great nuggets from John, be sure to follow him on Twitter at @JohnBattelle. To get an electronic copy of his presentation, please email me at jkim (at) sigmagroup.com.  The next post will recap Radian6’s workshop on “Why Listen to Social Media?”