Conference call video

In my groggy early morning scan of my social media feeds [code for: still in bed, half awake and squinting at my iPhone screen because the sun was hurting my eyes], I saw post after post after post about

It was hard to miss…

The Dreaded Nightmare of a Conference Call In Real Life [VIDEO]

— Mashable (@mashable)

— CollegeHumor (@CollegeHumor)

If you haven’t watched it yet, do yourself a favor and check it out:

Besides being one of the funniest videos I’ve seen this week [I mean, let’s be honest, we all love a good YouTube break every day], it also is a shining example of a social media win. If you didn’t pick up on it the first time, THIS IS A CONFERENCE PROMOTION!

This video was created as a promotion for Leadercast, a leadership conference for business executives. Sure, some people may have tuned out for the last few seconds where the conference was pitched, but sources of mine close to Leadercast say they’ve seen a significant jump in their web traffic in the last 24 hours as a result of this video being shared across social media.

I think this video is a huge win for a few reasons…

1 – When was the last time you were ever excited to watch a conference promo video?

The conference market is soooo saturated and with no shortage of conferences and networking events to attend, as a consumer, I’m very unlikely to watch your conference promotional video. I don’t care who’s speaking, how cool the graphics are, or what your theme for the year is. I’m not interested. I want to watch funny cat videos or check out GIFs on BuzzFeed.

The lineup of speakers for Leadercast is incredible… Malcom Gladwell, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Jack Welch, Laura Bush, Simon Sinek, Randall Wallace and many others. That’s a pretty killer lineup. The “zig” for most conference organizers would be to create a slick video that promotes the event and highlights all of the amazing speakers. Well, the folks at Leadercast made a big ZAG, and I feel like this video has already proven to be a successful one. While people may have tuned in to see a funny video about conference calls, Leadercast has now promoted their event and gotten their brand in front of [as of the time of this blog post] 120, 000+ viewers on YouTube in under 24 hours over 500, 000 viewers now! I don’t know how much they invested in creating this video, but I imagine they will see great ROI from it.

2 – Its’s right on target for the audience Leadercast wants to reach.

Business executives spend hours a week on conference calls and are all too familiar with everything that this video showed. It was relatable, funny, and true to life. There’s no better way to capture the attention of people you’re trying to reach than to share something they can relate to. Knowing your audience is key, and this proves to be right on target for who Leadercast wants to reach.