Comet Branding - Branding | PR | Social Media

K-Swiss Flexes Their Social Media Muscles

When it comes to social media, there are many approaches. Take Old Spice, they recently executed a campaign that has become one of the fastest-growing online video campaigns of all time. But what might work for some brands may not work for others. That is why I love what K-Swiss is doing in social media.

The California shoe company, looking to attract the coveted younger demographic, threw caution to the wind when designing a strategy for their new Tubes running shoes.

Instead of taking a traditional launch strategy into the marketplace, K-Swiss decided to take a more aggressive and non-traditional approach to their social media strategy. One not filled with blog posts about the science of the shoes, training videos, or behind the scenes footage. Instead, they embraced the foul-mouthed, egotistical spirit of their pitchman “Kenny Powers” played by actor Danny McBride.

What I love about this campaign is that it is aggressive and brash. Their campaign is all straight forward, no fluff. K-Swiss did not try to change the character of their spokesman, instead they embraced his persona and played it through the campaign.

Led by their Funny Or Die video, which I will warn you it is NSFW (language) and might offend people. Not me, because I think it is funny as @#*!.

To date it has paid off. Their ads posted on YouTube have received more than 170,000 hits, and the link has even been tweeted by Kane West to his 608,822 followers.

Their Facebook “Workout Wingman” application has been so popular it has crashed. They even have an iPhone application Tube Snap, which allows you to take a unique, fisheye lens photo, adding another layer to the overall promotion.

K-Swiss has clearly set its sights, shaking their brand image of the middle-aged country club tennis guy and converting to a more youthful appeal. There are not many brands that would take the risk and play outside their comfort zone.

I applaud their efforts. K-Swiss, you’re f’en in.

What do you think of K-Swiss’ campaign? What would you do differently? What are some of your favorite brands in social media?

Tags: california, danny mcbride, East bound and down, Facebook, K-swiss, kenny powers, Mike Wisniewski, Milwaukee, old spice