We’ve been delighted to share some incredible ‘viral’ marketing clips through Anthill TV. I’m talking about concepts and videos assembled by creative agencies to help promote a brand — short films designed to evoke surprise, make us laugh and sometimes even cause emotional discomfort.

When done well, the ‘viral’ video can be an incredibly powerful tool for promoting the USP of a product — such as this clip from MINI Cooper ^[1] — or it can simply be used to make us feel more positively about a brand — such as Volkswagen’s ‘fun theory’ campaign ^[2]. But sometimes (more often than most would like to admit) they simply fall flat.

So, why is it that this campaign from Coca-Cola left me with a bad taste in my mouth?

Coke vending machine advertisement (viral campaign)