If you’ve been under a rock, go check out the video on Yahoo! Sports.

Chances are, you saw this video within the first 48 hours of its release on YouTube or embedded in a blogs. This event is the hottest piece of content to go viral in recent memory. It’s just so darn cute! This guy is the epitome of “AWESOME DAD”, one I personally can relate to better than the fat dumb dad on any number of sitcoms and spots in the past decade.

It has all the elements of a classic story packed into 30 seconds: plot, character, theme, climax and resolution. A father’s pride, a child’s mistake, forgiveness, reconciliation. It’s so tightly bundled in a beautiful way, it becomes an instant Internet meme. It’s ripe for a super mash-up, something savvy marketers crave.

Unfortunately, the MLB lawyers have trumped all reason and yanked the video from all video-sharing sites, and by proxy, all embedded media like blogs and social networks. Video from their own site is coded in a manner that does not allow it to be played from anywhere except their site. Boom boom pow, this is so 2000 and late!

The MLB completely wasted an opportunity for the MLB to attach its brand to a heart-warming story. Mashable agrees. The MLB could have been recast in celebration of fatherhood or baseball as a family game.

I can already see the 30s spot: the touching video, professionally mastered with compelling V.O. or slide copy. That is fine. But it’s so much more sincere relating to the story when it’s shared among friends in ways they already communicate. Forcing everyone to go to a branded site loses a degree of authenticity.

Presumably, the brilliant legal minds at MLB responded from a flat-policy to defend against future video sharing. I understand the protective need, certainly an open license could be granted in these extraordinary cases. That is the difference between thoughtful leadership and policy management. Instead, the MLB reaction suggests pure greed in a game played by millionaires.

At least the Phillys are playing this up. I hear Dad is getting lots of swag and is making the talk-show circuit. That may seem greedy too, but this kind of PR is organic and altruistic. The team is offering up a wonderful story without the expectation of getting something in return. Big difference.

Clients, agencies and interactive production shops can use this checklist when registering brands with social networks & web 2.0 platforms for a specific campaign. This list is helpful for domain planning and for domainjacking avoidance.

UsernameCheck.com is a helpful utility that scans social tools to monitor domainjacking. Brand managers may elect to register brands with tools, even if they are not initially used in the campaign. Services like Profilactic.com can help with social media aggregation

» Last Modified December 10, 2008
» # of Platforms 93

Micromedia, Status

Social Bookmarking, Tagging, News, Trends, Lists

Blogging, Self Publication, Mashups, Aggregators

Rich Media, Video/Photo Sharing, Podcast Networks

Social Gaming

Social Communities, Networking

Enterprise, E-commerce, Tools, Utilities

* = High risk for domainjacking. Register these accounts at minimum for all campaigns. Certain types of campaigns may require accounts on other/all platforms.

Was this post helpful? Have any additions? Don’t agree with my taxonomy? I wanna know. Please talk back & leave a comment!

Last week, as the world celebrated another Talk Like a Pirate Day, I thought of a slick SEM trick: Buy quirky holiday names for the sole purpose of brand awareness. Quirky holiday inventory has temporary demand spikes and low-competitive rates. This might be good opportunities to align your brand with fun, off-beat culture news and catch new visitors during idle leisure time browsing the net.

Retailers have long used White Sale strategies to dump excessive inventory and to gain a temporary competitive advantage. The Quirky Holiday SEM strategy is slightly different than a White Sale. Rather than promote a branded self-made sales event, Quirky Holiday SEM leverages universal interest and PR surrounding unusual events to generate brand awareness. The strategy lends itself to retail, but could be used for any type of brand promotion.

Awareness and low cost can justify the ROI of a Quirky Holiday SEM media plan. Traffic is not targeted, so click-throughs are a bonus, especially since keyword inventory would be relatively inexpensive.

Ideas for Quirky Holiday SEM Campaigns

Here are just a few of the strange, funny and odd holidays where corporate brands, campaigns and associations could apply this strategy.

• Bifocals At The Monitor Liberation Day
  December 1 Lenscrafters, eye doctors & Lasik surgeons, ergonomic companies, nonprofits for the prevention of eyestrain, monitor fatigue, eyesight health education & disease prevention, elder care.
• Bathtub Party Day
  December 5 Kohler, Whirlpool re-modelers (bathfitter.com already has a placement), plumbing companies, design centers, home builders, destination spas.
• National Inane Answering Message Day
  January 30 Manufacturers like Panasonic, Sony, Nokia, Samsung & Motorola, online retailers, VoIP carries Skype and Vonage, cable carriers, cell phone service providers, mobile marketing.

• First Day of Autumn 2008
  September 22 SEO companies are already leveraging Google’s holiday and event logos for fresh non targeted traffic. What a clever ploy to generate a little buzz and new unique visits against an odd keyword. So far, these are simple organic SEO results, but SEM could easily apply.
   

  Hat tip to @PatrikAltoff who managed to attract hundreds of “autumn 08″ visitors to Blogstorm on Sep 22, 2008.

  

• Any Quirky Holiday
  Hallmark could actually target traffic with Quirky Holiday SEM, assuming they had matching merchandise. A smaller print card company or e-card service could generate a significant portion of its revenue on this SEM traffic.

What Quirky Holiday SEM Strategies can you imagine? Share them below!