Google Launches Video Ad for TV Effort

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Google snuck back into the chart this week, but unlike its Chrome browser clip (still one of the best things around, despite its lack of presence), the search giant grabbed eyeballs for a product that doesn't yet exist -- Google TV.

The Google-produced spot (new at No. 9 with over 600,000 views) is essentially an animated tutorial on how Google TV, theoretically, will work. It's a browser that can search and play both TV and web content over your snazzy new $1,500 TV. The aesthetic of the commercial fits into Silicon Valley's incarnate chart-speak, complete with a gravelly voice-over that offers insights such as, "These days, TV can be pretty complicated. Figuring out what you want to watch is hard enough."

It is interesting to note that Google, typically very deliberate and reserved when marketing its own products, would choose to promote something so early. Back in the early days of commercial software development, this practice was known as vaporware -- software yet to be released (and in some cases never made) but publicly pronounced as a way to mark territory.

Google's "Chrome Speed Test" was good enough to get a spoof from tiny rival Opera Software, which pits the browser against an uncooked potato. That video came in at No. 8.

Rounding out the newcomers is Craftsman's "Music Experiment" in the sixth slot. The clip features "music" created entirely on Craftsman tools and edited by one of the most widely watched post-modern cut-up guys in the business, Ophir Kutiel, also known as Kutiman, who came to fame for his "ThruYou" project, one of YouTube's most-watched clips and considered by Time magazine as one of the 50 best inventions of 2009.

The World Cup suffers no weltschmerz this week as Nike holds first place with its "Write the Future" campaign. Pepsi's "Oh Africa" moves up to No. 2 with a 50% increase in views from the previous week. Expect World Cup-themed video ads to dominate the chart over the coming weeks. The question is whether they'll sustain over the course of the month-long tournament.

	Last Week	Brand	Campaign	Agency	Current Week Views*	% Change in Views**	Watch the Spot
1	1	Nike	Write the Future	Wieden & Kennedy	7,719,922	-1%
2	4	Pepsi	Oh Africa	N/A	1,501,184	+48%
3	2	Toyota	The Sienna Family	Saatchi & Saatchi	1,195,101	-27%
4	3	Evian	Live Young	BETC Euro RSCG	931,947	-10%
5	10	Fortnight Lingerie	Super Sexy CPR	Red Urban	889,673	101%
6	NEW	Craftsman	Music Experiment	Young & Rubicam	865,957	NEW
7	6	YouTube	YouTube Turns 5	N/A	729,984	22%
8	New	Opera Software	World Record Speed Test	In-house	664,897	NEW
9	NEW	Google	Google TV	N/A	618,759	NEW
10	7	Old Spice	Odor Blocker	Wieden & Kennedy	541,782	-7%
Source: Visible Measures *The Visible Measures Top 10 Viral Video Ad Campaigns Chart focuses on brand-driven viral video ads that appear on online-video-sharing destinations. Each campaign is measured on a True Reach basis, which includes viewership of both brand-syndicated video clips and viewer-driven social video placements. The data are compiled using the Visible Measures Viral Reach Database, a constantly growing repository of analytic data on more than 100 million internet videos across more than 150 video-sharing destinations. Note: This analysis does not include Visible Measures' paid-placement (i.e., overlays, pre-/mid-/post-roll) performance data or video views on private sites. This chart does not include movie trailers, video-game campaigns, TV show or media network promotions, or public service announcements. View-count results are incremental by week. **Indicates percent change in views compared with the same period the week before. To notify Visible Measures of an upcoming video ad campaign, or for an end-to-end assessment of your campaign's overall performance, please contact Visible Measures directly.