BMW’s chart-topping spot on this week’s Adweek/VidIQ top 10 branded video chart shows that insane car moves still do the trick for automakers in grabbing YouTube views.
BMW’s "The Epic Driftmob" video plays off the success of flash mobs in videos to create a "driftmob," which happens when multiple cars hit the same speed and pull off tricks simultaneously. As the cars race around a blocked street area, bystanders whip out their smartphones to document the event.
The automaker’s two-minute spot has been viewed 12.3 million times, generating 4,520 Facebook shares and 1,740 tweets since it was uploaded on July 29. BMW’s spot beats out ESPN’s viral poker clip, which was the No. 1 video last week. The spot has also logged a bit of chatter with 1,230 YouTube and 1,500 Facebook comments.
The spot fits into a broader campaign from BMW called #BMWStories that highlights the individual stories behind BMW owners. In conjunction with the video, BMW released a behind-the-scenes spot (which has been watched more than 184,000 times) showing how the racers in The Epic Driftmob prepared for the event.
Several big names from last week return to the chart again this week, including Johnnie Walker Blue’s Jude Law spot, Under Armour’s "I Will What I Want" and Old Navy’s musical back-to-school campaign.
New videos this week come from Samsung, GoPro, Adidas and PlayStation. Three of those—Adidas, PlayStation and Samsung—include a paid media push to generate some buzz.
The interactive VidIQ-powered infographic below lets readers watch all of this week’s videos and view stats about their reach.
NOTE: Adweek's VideoWatch Chart, powered by VidIQ, reveals the Top 10 Branded Web Videos on YouTube every week. The chart tracks more than just pure views, as VidIQ incorporates sharing data from Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, among other data sources, in an effort to measure true engagement. Every video is also ranked with VidIQ’s proprietary Score, which helps judge the likelihood of a video being promoted in YouTube Related Videos, Search and Recommended Videos.