One of the most important elements of any venture is inspiration.
Humans like to have heroes or idols to look up to, people to
examine and hold up as the best examples of success. It is
reassuring on a very basic level to be able to point to someone
and say; "They did it, so I know it can be done."
With that in mind, consider the following web branding success
stories. These are not the names that are usually thrown about,
like YouTube or Facebook. Rather, these are people who have
developed a niche success in their own field, and have become
world-famous brands in their own way, and their own time.
Zero Punctuation: The Saga of Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw
Few stories are as appealing as those of overnight success, and
the story of Yahtzee seems to fit the bill. Around late 2007, he
posted a pair of video animations to YouTube. In these videos
little paper-cutout-style characters enacted humorous scenes
against a yellow backdrop while Yahtzee reviewed video games in a
slightly frantic tone of voice. Yahtzee tore into the games'
flaws with a vigor and incisive sense of humor that spoke
directly to the irony-conscious gamers of today. Shortly
thereafter, an online gaming magazine called The Escapist hired
Yahtzee to produce the videos on a weekly basis for its site.
The result was an explosion of interest. The Escapist's traffic
jumped nearly 400 percent following the addition of Yahtzee's
series, dubbed "Zero Punctuation" because of his increasingly
trademark style of rapid-fire speech with few pauses for breath.
The white avatars on yellow background have become icons of the
gaming world, recognizable at a glance. Major game designers such
as Fable's Peter Myoleneaux have responded directly to
Yahtzee's criticism and sent him their newest game to review as
well, even knowing that he is likely to treat this second effort
even more brutally than the first.
Of course, Yahtzee actually isn't an example of overnight
success at all. He's been a gamer for more than 20 years, having
played others' games and designed his own as well. He's
developed his signature style with dedicated hard work, and the
hard work ultimately was rewarded when the right audience was
found. The lesson here is both that brands must be ready to jump
on the opportunities of the moment, but also be prepared to put
in a great deal of work and effort for their brand to succeed.
Yahtzee currently writes for the Escapist, as well as his own
website, Fully Ramblomatic, and the Australian magazine Hyper. He
resides in Australia, and still produces the weekly ZP show.
Nostalgia Critic: Remembering It So You Don't Have To
Continuing the theme of YouTube branding success, another tale is
that of Doug Walker, popularly known as That Guy With the
Glasses. A few years ago, Doug began uploading a series of short
videos to YouTube touching on things he found entertaining. His
5-second-movies feature was a deconstructionist look at popular
films by editing them down to brief impressions, while the
Nostalgia Critic was a persona he used to examine popular films
and series his generation grew up with. From there, everything
exploded into a story of epic web success.
He left YouTube to found his own site with several friends who
had lost their retail day jobs. They expanded on the content of
the site, adding new characters, additional writers and
performers. A team of fellow critics and reviewers became Team
TGWTG, video gamers come to the site under the title of Blistered
Thumbs, and the site has gradually prospered (if by gradually of
course one means that from 2008 to 2009 the site began making
$10,000 per month).
Perhaps the biggest element of this brand's success is Walker's
rivalry with fellow nostalgic reviewer, the Angry Video Game
Nerd. AVGN is a series reviewing nostalgic cartridge video games,
and the similarities between the two series sparked comments
among the series' fans that one or the other might be stealing
the concept. Taking this idea to a perhaps bizarre new level, the
Critic and the Nerd launched a series of videos detailing their
epic battles and struggles to claim the title of "winner," and
both their viewerships prospered from it.
Walker's story is an inspiring one because of the sheer scale of
his success. In less than a decade he has gone to making sums of
money one would normally associate with a major business venture.
Yet at the core of it, he and his friends make short videos about
old movies from the 1980s, in their homes, with software and
equipment you can pick up at any computer store. Yet now there
are people going to comic and movie conventions costumed as the
Critic or his cronies, and the various pop culture lines he
references have become a new canon of online in jokes.
Closing Thoughts
These two stories are not the rule. There are many reviewers out
there who haven't achieved the level of success these people
have. However, the fact that they have achieved it at all shows
that it can be done, and both stories share the same important
lesson for anyone interested in branding: Do what you love.
Neither of these two Internet heroes has branding as his first
priority. Instead, the priority is on doing something they love,
and always doing it well. Walker's first Nostalgia Critic video
is of noticeably poorer quality than his newest videos, and Zero
Punctuation has grown more eclectic and daring in its animations
as time has gone on. These two have a passion for what they want
to see done, and the brand has grown as a result of the effort
and love they have put into it. If you take no other lesson from
their story, take this one: do something you love, and do it
well.
Enzo F. Cesario is an online branding specialist
and co-founder of Brandsplat, a digital content
agency. Brandsplat creates blogs, articles, videos
and social media in the "voice" of our client's
brand. It makes sites more findable and brands more
recognizable. For the free Brandcasting Report go to: http://www.BrandSplat.com/ or visit our blog at: http://www.iBrandCasting.com/.
