In a rare collaboration, YouTube is rolling out a new commercial starring the characters from The Simpsons, in which Homer is seen using YouTube video ads to boost his snow-plow business, Mr. Plow.
Ad agency Camp + King helped to craft the spot, which starts off by featuring footage from the original episode. But when Homer's business falls on hard times, Lisa Simpson jumps on YouTube and signs him up for the TrueView advertising program. The point, on which Google elaborates in a new blog post, is that YouTube isn't just for big-budget marketers—it can help small and medium-size businesses as well.
"Video advertisers like Homer can see how people are engaging with his video ad and use this information to make small but important changes to his campaign," the post says. "Are people finishing your video ad? Consider shortening it. Is your view rate lower than you'd like? Potentially make the first five seconds more interesting."
If you're wondering why Homer wasn't using YouTube ads from the beginning, there's an easy explanation: YouTube didn't launch until 2005, a full 13 years after the "Mr. Plow" episode first aired.
CREDITS
Client: Google/YouTube
Agency: Camp + King
Chief Executive Officer: Jamie King
Chief Creative Officer: Roger Camp
Creative Director: Rikesh Lal
Associate Creative Director: Justin Hargraves
Copywriter: Mary Hernandez
Visual Effects Designer: Zach Corzine
Brand Director: Emily Dillow
Brand Managers: Kelsey Towbis, Grace Lazarus
Director of Content Production: Stacy McClain
Content Producers: David Verhoef, Vince Genovese
Talent/Property Negotiation: Vanessa Bendetti
Business Affairs: Tricia Krasneski
Postproduction: Misfit
Executive Producer: Jim Vaughan
Editor: Matt O'Donnell
Assistant Editor: Marissa Rosado
Audio Post: M-Squared
Sound Engineer: Mark Pitchford
Assistant Sound Engineer: Phil Lantz