I heard about this commercial not long after the Superbowl, and thought it was an interesting way to quietly go viral. I’m sure Old Spice was hoping that word would spread faster than its creepy commercials of recent past, and it seemed to work.
I may be dating myself, but for those of you who remember dialing 867-5309 back in the day to see if you could really talk to “Jenny” as the popular song goes, this commercial was reminiscent of that.
Old Spice ran a commercial, which is still slightly creepy in nature, as the man’s hair scoots across the table to get a female colleague’s phone number, but take a look at what’s different:
Did you catch it? If not, the screen shot below points out the one minor detail in this commercial that makes viewers curious, if they’re paying attention that is:
Unlike phone numbers shown on TV, this one doesn’t follow the standard 555-5555 protocol. It’s a real number, and as one lucky viewer shared, it was more curious because it was a toll-free number.
Curiosity got the best of many, but one lucky viewer called the number and was awarded with free tickets to the Superbowl, as well as spending money and a few other perks. There is reportedly one other person who won tickets, and according to reports, over 12,000 viewers were curious enough to call the number in the commercial to see what happened.
This is quite a unique promotional move on Old Spice’s part; something very simple, with a nice reward is a sure fire way for the brand to get some viral attention!
