No More Hiding Your Kids, Wife, or Husband. Media Meditition #4

Hey out there. Flipper here. Have you ever bought a product and used it for unconventional means? Like buying Coke and Mentos, putting them together, and watching them explode? Flipper has. That’s called accidental marketing: consumers buying a product, not for its intended purpose, but because one can do something cool with it. Now let me ask you this: have you ever done the opposite? Have you ever seen something comical and bought that product to use for a serious cause because of that comical reason? Flipper has.

Everyone with a computer has probably seen the “Bed Intruder” video on Youtube. Going viral with over sixteen million hits, this video is probably one of the funniest videos of 2010.




But it didn’t stop there. Soon, an auto tuned version of the report was released, doubling the number of hits at thirty-five million.




Obtaining over fifty-one million hits, one realized they could make this craze into a legitimate product.




The new bed intruder app, available for the iPhone and Android, shows the user where various sex offenders locations. However, the ad is not entirely accurate. “While the promotion video is hilarious, it's also misleading because in fact, the Sex Offender Tracker App only shows you the houses in your neighborhood where sex offenders live.” Still, it is a very useful app to have.

The entire concept of this new app is very entertaining: taking viral videos, and using the fan base of those videos to market a new product. The main techniques of this ad are humor, fear and testimonial. The creators are using a comical figure that millions of people recognize to market this product that can protect you and you’re family.


Anyway, I wonder if there is anyone living near my dorm I should worry about. Flipper is going bed intruder hunting. And you can tell that.