Virtual Bartender (virtualbartender.beer.com) was a viral marketing campaign launched in 2004 by beer.com, which featured an online interactive 'virtual bartender', played by Playboy model Tammy Plante.[1][2] When a request, such as 'pour me a beer,' 'dance on the bar' or 'fight like a Jedi', was recognized the 'virtual bartender' carried out the task before returning to her idling position to await another request.[3] There were over 120 different actions and thousands of different words and phrases that produced a response. The company claimed that the site received over 10 million visits and 200 million page views in its first month of release.[3]
Chapter 1: Installing and Using BarTender 5 3. Follow the instructions given by the setup program. Installing MDAC (Optional) Perform these steps on every Windows 95/98/Me/NT computer on which you plan to have BarTender read label data from databases. (On Windows 95 computers, you must install DCOM first. Refer to Installing DCOM for. With Super Jump ' s cancellation, the series moved to the then–new Grand Jump, in which Bartender was serialized during November and December 2011. Its chapters were eventually collected into twenty-one volumes, with the first volume released on December 3, 2004, and the final volume on February 17, 2012.
In the spring of 2005, the campaign released a second Virtual Bartender game, featuring two models instead of one.[4]
Jodi Lyn O'Keefe Gail, Isabella 3 Episodes (2004-2010) John Amos Ed 3 Episodes (2010-2010) John Stamos Himself 3 Episodes (2015-2015) Martin Mull Russell 3 Episodes (2010-2013). Virtual Bartender Girlfriends & Live Girls Online. Solar System Scope 3D Online. Unreal Tournament 2004 DM Map-By Elmer Updated 3-6-14.
History[edit]
Jodi Lyn O'Keefe Gail, Isabella 3 Episodes (2004-2010) John Amos Ed 3 Episodes (2010-2010) John Stamos Himself 3 Episodes (2015-2015) Martin Mull Russell 3 Episodes (2010-2013). Virtual Bartender Girlfriends & Live Girls Online. Solar System Scope 3D Online. Unreal Tournament 2004 DM Map-By Elmer Updated 3-6-14.
History[edit]
The site was launched on Thursday 4 November 2004 (between 9:00 p.m. and Midnight Eastern Standard Time). Ten emails were sent out to friends of beer.com from their office to beta test 'Virtual Bartender'.[5] No other form of marketing was used and there were not any links from the home page or any other sites. No search engine marketing, banner ads or offline media were used to promote the campaign.
- November 5, 2004: More than 15,000 sessions. The first 'Fan Forum' appeared from the UK where young DJs talked about the commands they discovered.
- November 6: Sessions began doubling - 30,000. More 'Fan Forums' appeared around the world (Holland, Italy, Japan, USA)
- November 10: Over 500,000 sessions. Still going viral - The only way to get the Virtual bartender was through forwarded emails and the increasing number of 'Fan Forums' appearing in search engines. At that point, the average length of visit was 7 minutes and page views reached 7,980,000.
- By day 28 the site had reached 10 million sessions. It continued to receive hundreds of thousands of visitors each week.
Virtual Bartender won 'Best Interactive Viral' at the 2004 Viral Awards.[6] The creative director of the campaign was Rick Brown.[5][6]
By 2008, the site was no longer active.[7]
Beer.com[edit]
The url 'beer.com' was bought in 1998 for $80,000 by domain speculators Andrew Miller and Michael 'Zappy' Zapolin, operating as the 'Internet Real Estate Group'.[8] They reportedly 'built an audience for the site by giving out free e-mail addresses and having fans rate different brews,' but the real pay day came when they sold it for $7 million to mega-brewer Interbrew less than a year later.[8]
The 'Beer.com' which came up with the Virtual Bartender then came online (in 1999), with Interbrew executive Rocco Rossi named president, and was touted as an online community directed to males age 18-34.[9][10][11][12]
Bartender 3 1 2004 Mustang
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ^'Tammy, beer.com's on-line bartender, is web sensation'. Modern Brewery Age. December 13, 2004. Retrieved June 23, 2010.
- ^Pia Sarkar (August 27, 2005). 'A different way of selling clothes'. San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved June 23, 2010.
- ^ ab'With Tammy as your Bartender, Youll Never Run Out of Beer Again; Online interactive video feature from beer.com is an overnight sensation'. PR Newswire (beer.com press release). December 9, 2004. Retrieved June 23, 2010.
- ^Steve Hall (April 15, 2005). 'Beer.com Launches Virtual Bartender II'. AdRants.com. Retrieved June 23, 2010.
- ^ abPierre Hamilton (December 16, 2004). 'Beer.com's Virtual Bartender'. Strategy. Retrieved June 23, 2010.
- ^ abThe Viral Awards Winners, Retrieved June 23, 2010
- ^Internet Archive listing for www.virtualbartender.beer.com/VB1, Retrieved June 23, 2010
- ^ ab'The Domains Of The Day, How two Boston entrepreneurs are making millions from names as simple as chocolate.com'. Business Week. June 25, 2007. Retrieved June 23, 2010.
- ^'Beer site is the next best thing to tasting'. The Dallas Morning News. November 3, 1999. Retrieved June 23, 2010.
- ^Beer.com Launches Podcast (Press release, May 25, 2006), Retrieved June 23, 2010 (about us section: 'Beer.com is the ultimate men's lifestyle website and The Authority on Beer Culture. Founded in 1999, the site is a leading marketer to males 18-34 and is dedicated to being 'The Ultimate Destination' for the hottest, funniest, coolest things online.')
- ^Ann Perry (October 13, 1999). 'Belly up to the Web bar for new taste of beer.com ; Interbrew site aims to satisfy online thirst'. Toronto Star. Retrieved June 23, 2010.
- ^Stephen Barrington (November 1, 1999). 'BELGIAN BREWER INTERBREW SUPPORTS BEER LOVERS' SITE'. Advertising Age. Retrieved June 23, 2010.[dead link]
How do you lure 9.3 million unique visitors to your Web site in three weeks? Take the premise of Burger King's widely popular ‘Subservient Chicken,' then substitute the chicken for Tammy, a ‘Virtual Bartender' who's willing to please.
That's the winning formula behind Beer.com‘s viral campaign. The effort began with 10 e-mail invites sent to pals of Beer.com staff in November. Web traffic increased 800%; the site regained its number one status under a Google search for ‘beer' and
advertisers from the U.K., Spain and Italy bought ad space.
More than 10,000 visitors joined the pub club, a section (where membership is free) that grants visitors full access to the site and over 2,500 signed up for Beer.com e-mail addresses. The campaign was such a success that Beer.com created a fan club that sells Tammy souvenirs and increased the commands she can perform.
Peers Tom Short, VP creative services at Calgary's Rare Method, and Tony Chapman, president at Toronto's Capital C, step up to the virtual bar, place their orders and rate the campaign.
Concept
TS: Sex sells – or does it? The virtual bartender at Beer.com is a voyeuristic, fun campaign that is perfectly suited for the audience [19- to 25-year-old males] and the Web site.
TC: The advertisers that Beer.com attracts are online casino operators, dating services, beer fridges, plus the merchandise that they sell through their online store. Their strategy of dramatically increasing the number of sticky male eyeballs, through their virtual bartender, is brilliant. An outstanding example of viral marketing.
Interactive
TS: This was more fun than bossing a man in a chicken suit around. Strangely, chick fight was the best command – try it.
The Internet is a social animal and it did as [well as] any provocative, well-done product would do through a small initial e-mail. Still it did not make it easy to forward the site to a friend – so it missed even greater results. https://bikesdatenergy.weebly.com/angels-of-the-wind-casino-coupons.html. The core audience will come back but it is a novelty that will lose its appeal. You can easily search for all the cheats on line to get the commands – so you can blow through the tricks fast.
Bartender 3 1 2004 Bmw
TC: Because of the simplicity of the controls, users stick around. The bravado attached with viral marketing is how few seeded e-mails are required to create an online phenomenon. I have to believe that the investment they made justified more than 10 e-mails to launch it. At the very least the initial 10 were most likely targeted to friends, and included a strong call to action to forward it on to as many people as possible. The numbers they realized were sensational.
The results
TS: As a brand campaign serving the target audience it achieves high marks. [But] often the hype of a campaign like this overshadows the primary goal unless the call to action is clear to the user. I had fun, the execution was great, and then I left. Hmmmm. Logitech k750 keyboard not working.
[It got] lots of visitors but are they the right visitors? Old guys like me are not the market, yet I did visit the site and tell other old guys like me about it. The impressions [beer.com is] getting may not be what it's targeting, resulting in zero value to advertisers. https://downafile408.weebly.com/giants-gold-slot-machine.html. https://hereofil222.weebly.com/mega-slot-machine-wins.html. Going on a road tour for poster signing events and/or hosting exclusive events with the VB would be the next best thing, and then you would get the high-value audience to sign up.
TC: I was surprised they didn't ask viewers to register, even as an incentive to unlock new commands. This would have given them a rich database to mine – in terms of releasing the next version of VB, supporting their advertising base, and their online store.
The creds:
Agency: D3
Client: Beer.com
Copywriters: Rick Brown, Paul MacLaren, Jason McCann, Andrew MacDonald
Creative director: Rick Brown
Interactive/Web development: Shaun Larkin
Video production: three60 Communications
