Mr Beach Bum.com

If you haven’t heard of Blendtec, don’t worry. I’m sure you’ve probably heard of “Will it Blend?” Well that is the genius (as far as I’m concerned) viral marketing campaign that Blendtec started awhile back. Let’s take a brief look at just how this brilliant little idea has resulted in Blendtec’s success.

I have seen the videos on Youtube. Some of my favorites include Spam and Eggs, the iPod, and who could forget the infamous rake handle,which is one of the first ones I remember seeing. You can’t go on Youtube without seeing a Will it Blend episode - it’s that simple. So how many blenders are they selling, anyway?

Well the answer is, a lot! But more importantly for our interest is the popularity of their website. I’m sure many of you are familiar with Alexa ranking.  If not, just go to Alexa.com and see for yourself. If you look at willitblend.com right now, you’ll see them around 21,000. If you look at their averages, they went up over 129% in the last 3 months! The interesting thing is that blentec.com (the actual site where they sell blenders) doesn’t even seem to count on Alexa. But even more interesting is the fact that willitblend.com shows a trend of getting even higher numbers right around the time that other major product launches have occurred.  (See the Alexa page for stats).

So what gives? Well, their most recent “Will it Blend” episode actually features an iPhone… Therein lies the genius! It all boils down to the fact that this company has found a way to ride the coattails of trends in just about any industry all without doing any expensive commercials (have you seen a single Blendtec commercial on TV?) or really spending much more than the cost of a “Will it Blend” episode and posting it up on Youtube. 

So how does this apply to you? It’s simple. Find a way for your business or your product to ride the waves of the big trends. Use tools like Youtube, Digg, etc to get the word out about your product. You don’t need to spend a ton of money for advertising if you can use the right tools effectively. And Blentec is living proof!