How Logitech built brand awareness through YouTube

18- to 24-year-olds have not traditionally been the target of marketing campaigns by computer and digital peripheral product maker Logitech, but they are consumers it wanted to reach. So to get the word out on its moderately priced QuickCam digital video camera, it turned to the online social networking environment, becoming one of the first paying advertisers to run a branded contest on YouTube’s contest platform in a campaign that concluded earlier this year.

“The idea was that for as little as $29, you, too, can be a YouTuber,” says Todd Hernandez, product marketing manager at Logitech.

While anyone can launch video and run a contest on YouTube for free, Logitech determined the basic tools didn’t provide enough visibility for what it wanted to do. Marketers have the option of paying for advertising on YouTube to drive traffic to their contests and they also get the contest platform that includes voting functionality, according to YouTube. They also get enhanced design capabilities. About 20 brand manufacturers have so far run ad-supported, branded contests, YouTube says.

Logitech’s call to action invited contestants to upload videos showing how not to do something in the category of their choice. Partnering with Smosh, a duo known currently as a leading producer of video on YouTube, it produced a video that announced the contest and provided examples of contest entries. Of the 1,700 entries, about 600 were qualified for display by Hernandez, who screened them for inappropriate material, copyright violations and relevance to the contest topic.

The 600 videos displayed on YouTube got millions of views, Hernandez says. Viewers voted to award one of the prizes; Smosh picked the other winner.

But did the campaign sell Logitech QuickCams?

Hernandez says Logitech didn’t track through from YouTube to sales on Logitech’s e-commerce site, but that the site represents only a very small portion of Logitech’s sales as most of its products are purchased in stores. “We do know from a past campaign that was posted on YouTube using our webcam that sales of the product on places like Amazon definitely did tick up,” he says. “So we know from that that tying Logitech webcams to popular videos on YouTube has increased sales.”

Hernandez says Logitech’s two main metrics going into the campaign were the number of contest entries and the number of contest viewers. Contest results exceeded expectations on both counts, he says. Logitech also dug into metrics such as registrations, the use of tell-a-friend e-mails and click-throughs on contest banner advertising. Though he did not disclose numbers, Hernandez says Logitech is “very pleased, given that this is a demographic Logitech hadn’t previously targeted.” Traditional online metrics were a lesser objective of this campaign, Hernandez explains. “I was more interested in brand awareness, product functionality awareness, growing the category and reaching that audience,” he says. Against these measures the campaign also performed well, he says.

Hernandez didn’t reveal the cost of the campaign—which included the prizes of drum lessons with Travis Barker of the band Blink-182 and rap lessons with rapper Jibbs. But he offers this insight for marketers considering similar social networking campaigns targeting the youth demographic: pick partners that resonate with the target audience and build ongoing relationships with them early on.

“If you looked at this randomly it would be a very expensive campaign, in six figures,” Hernandez says. “But we’ve built a lot of relationships within YouTube and with people in the arts and entertainment space, setting up symbiotic relationships where everybody benefits and there is a lot of trust. So it wasn’t as pricey as it might have been. Others have called us and asked how they can do what we did, and I tell them if you haven`t already started building these kinds of relationships, then get ready to write some very large checks.”