Construction company 84 Lumber created their own Super Bowl history this past Sunday in the form of a seemingly pro-immigration commercial that depicted the journey of a Hispanic mother and her daughter from their home country into the United States.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPo2B-vjZ28
The Ad
The commercial originally deemed “too controversial” for the Super Bowl by Fox was edited for both time and subject matter prior to being aired. We’ll let you draw your own conclusions as to why some parts were decidedly too much for TV.
84 Lumber president and owner, Maggie Hardy Magerko was quoted saying about the portion that did not air on television, "It's not about the wall. It's about the door in the wall. If people are willing to work hard and make this country better, that door should be open to them." We agree. Hats off to the largest privately owned building company for taking a stand on an issue that is drawing a lot of heat from both sides.
The Holdup
To support the broadcast campaign, the company released its full 6 minute video on their website, as well as Twitter and YouTube prior to the commercial airing. The commercial inspired people to take to the internet and search for Lumber 84 between half-time and the third quarter. This resulted in an overload of their host server and ( their website going down (http://adage.com/article/super-bowl/84-lumber-made-a-statement-website-crashed/307870/)) for about ten minutes or so.
How could a lumber company create viral content destined for greatness without first making sure that the infrastructure of their site could handle the amount of hits?
How much is 10 minutes worth to you?
Creating viral content is an art that when well-executed has the power to not only inspire but to generate more coverage than possibly any other form of media, advertising, or sales tactic. Viral content is shareable, timely, and happily shared among consumers without the creative team behind it having to invest more time and money into marketing it.
If you saw our previous post on problems that can happen with your Wordpress site, then you know that there are many things that can cause your website to go down. The reality is most businesses who pay for cheap hosting are exposed to this risk, and (even if your website doesn’t make $116,000 per minute (link:https://www.quora.com/If-the-Amazon-website-was-to-go-down-how-much-money-would-it-lose-per-minute)) it makes good business sense to have a plan ahead of time for an influx of website traffic.
Anticipate your outcome.
When creating something awesome, don’t doubt that it has the potential to catch on. 84 Lumber’s commercial, even after being edited, had all of the makings of quality viral content. It took on an issue that people have been passionately debating for months, and it questioned beliefs about what it means to be a human and to have compassion for our fellow men (and women!). Timely + Feels.