Viral Video Ads

Flexsim has the opportunity to produce one or a few low budget, video advertisements to promote the use of simulation in business. Ideally, these would be 20-30 second videos showing the advantages of using simulation.

We're inviting the community to help come up with some good, funny ideas that would make for a good viral video marketing campaign. We're thinking of the kind of videos that your old college roommate sends you in email, or that your uncle tells you about over the holidays. Funny stuff. Short stuff. But still with a bent toward educating people about the benefits of simulation.

Use this thread to share your ideas, or make comments on others' ideas. Thanks for the help! Lets let everyone out there know how useful simulation can be!

One last note - any ideas that you share become public knowledge and you agree to allow us to use your idea without any more compensation than a hearty "thank you" and heaps of community-forum-celebrity and good will. Maybe we can increase your forum Rep Power or something. I hear its hard to come by.

I'll get the ball rolling and provide a couple of video ideas.

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2 factory workers are at their positions but totally goofing off. Then they see the boss coming and quickly pretend to be busy. The boss isn't happy. She knows they weren't working. She stops in front of them and zaps them with "magic" and poof! they disappear.

During all of that an announcer could say something like "Not sure whether the goof offs on line 2 are necessary? Do you ever wish you could do this?(poof!) Simulate it!"

Ad cuts to boss in office doing a simulation. She deletes the two workers from the simulation and smiles. Then she leans back with her hands behind her head and looks out her office window over looking the factory at the 2 guys who are back to goofing off.

During that segment the announcer says "Test new ideas before putting them into practice. Eliminate risk, maximize potential." or something like that.
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The same ad could be done with an old robot or other pieces of equipment that are malfunctioning. Then you don't have people getting the idea that simulation is all about eliminating jobs.

You could also do something similar with adding people or equipment to a production line that is struggling. Lots of potential "magic" ads that turn the magic into someone doing a simulation to get the answers.

Another idea has two somewhat dimwitted guys doing stupid things. You could have a whole series of ads similar to the following (thanks to Brenton and Paul).

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2 guys sitting in shopping carts at the top of a long hill, getting ready to head down, tweedle-dum is totally gung-ho, whereas tweedle-dee seems more cautious.

Tweedle-Dum: bouncing up and down, excited to go.
Tweedle-Dee: "Hmmm, I don't know, I think I'll simulate first".

While Tweedle-Dee simulates, Tweedle-Dum just goes for it.

Tweedle-Dum has a rough, dangerous, and painful ride to be bottom, ending in a painful crash right when the Tweedle-Dee sees a painful crash in the simulation.

Tweedle-Dee (looking at the simulation with a cringe): "wow, good thing I simulated!"
Tweedle-Dum (moaning in a tangled, mangled, painful heap at the bottom of the hill): "why didn't I simulate?"
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This idea doesn't target any sort of industry that we'd like to, just two silly guys. Granted, you could do a dozen similar spin offs of them trying various stupid things. I guess its like the mac/pc ads, where there are two guys, each with their own stereotype. This idea is good for low budget since its just outside with only two actors.

Here are a couple:

1. Collect a few or more videos of people doing things that painfully don't go according to plan (ie my back flop off a cliff). After you show enough to get a good laugh you can cut to a shot of Flexsim or someone using Flexsim and say something like: "Don't you wish you could simulate everything before trying it?"

2. Show a father/mother with 1 or more too many screaming children and cut back and forth to the same guy/girl at work trying to manage the same number of delinquent operators at work. Then say something like: "For some employees are like children once you have them you have to wait until they grow older and retire to get rid of them, simulate it first." or "Before you have 1 to many, simulate it." Here is a sample video for a European latex company:

3. Person A looks at Person B and says, "We need to get rid of Person C" Person B day dreams of the multiple ways to do so: Gun, poison, blunt instrument to head, choke them out and drag them off, any other humorous way, etc. Cut to Person B deleting an operator in Flexsim and say "It's never as easy in the real world".

These are obviously a little darker and slanted toward the PAINFULLY funny side. More importantly they are videos that would take a minimum of people and special settings.

Ben,

For the Tweedle-Dee/Dum one: Maybe Dee looks down at his laptop to simulate it and Dum gives it a go without Dee noticing. After crash/painful ending the unaware Dee says "Oooh thats a bad one" only to look up and see the result had already played itself out.

Another variant of this may be to show a video like this:
Where the guy crashes and another one where the guy makes it and say: "This difference between this and this is this" and then cut to Flexsim.

Love the annoying-kid video!

Brandon's tag line "Don't you wish you could simulate everything before trying it?" could be tagged onto the likes of Charlie Chaplin's conveyor belt scketch in the movie "Modern times" could be used to see when Automation goes wrong (start) or chaos of a process (about 4 minutes in)
or

I'm sure there might be better but it's the movie i remembered.

The reason the old movies might be of use is that they may be out of copyright.

Kenny