Do you remember the off-the-wall Superbowl ad featuring a suave, manly man describing the manliness of Old Spice? (If you don’t, the ad is embedded below.) At that point the advertising campaign was good – witty, memorable, and on-brand. But this week, the campaign evolved into one of the best advertising campaigns we’ve seen in a while.

The now-famous “Old Spice Guy” begun answering questions and comments from users that were submitted via Facebook, YouTube, and other social networks. The videos were hilarious, personal, and on-brand. See an example below. Most importantly, it wasn’t just one or two videos – over the course of two days, the team created over 100 video responses, which ended up generating well over 4 million views (and they are continuing to rise!).

Here are a few facts about the campaign:

According to Google, there have been over 7,000 blog posts written in the past week that contain the words “Old Spice Guy.”

The Old Spice Channel is now the #2 most-viewed sponsor channel on YouTube, with over 61 Million views.

The online campaign strategically responded to influencers online. The Old Spice Guy responded to celebrities such as Ashton Kutcher, Alyssa Milano, and Kevin Rose. But he didn’t forget about the little people either, and made sure to answer plenty of comments from average joes. This made sure that the messaging was authentic and engaging, but also sure to reach millions of people.

Here are some impressions from our team about the campaign:

“The pure volume of videos (183 in two days!) is astounding!” – Lucas

“The consistency of hilarity in the videos is amazing.” – Jocelyn

“The frequency of videos, at times, was mind-boggling – as fast as a video every 5 minutes. When you think about the fact that each video required finding an appropriate comment to respond to, thinking of a response, filming a take (probably several), some quick edits, and uploading the video, this is a very impressive statistic. And they kept it up hour after hour, for two days straight.” – Bailey

“I know it’s subjective, but I honestly want to go buy Old Spice body wash now. I don’t know why. Maybe it’s because I feel like I owe the brand for all the laughs they gave me over the past few days. Maybe it’s because I want to be like  that guy Isaiah Mustafa. Maybe it’s because I’ve always liked Old Spice, and this will just push me over the edge. Either way, this is great advertising – not because it is entertaining or well-produced, but because at the end of the day, it makes me want the product being sold.” – Andrew

“Blatant Old Spice promotion. The videos are anything but subtle, and the blatant promotion fits with the personality of the campaign. As a viewer, I was content with the promotion because it was a small price to pay for such hilarity.” – Anna

If you are interested in exactly how this was orchestrated, here is a blog (from ReadWriteWeb) post that explains how Wieden and Kennedy (Old Spice’s Agency) created such a phenomenon: http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/how_old_spice_won_the_internet.php