What is the definition of YouTube success?

A global brand is on YouTube. Is that enough or should its videos be entertaining too?

Real estate agents are not the most innovative marketers—effective maybe, but not innovative. For every agent with a blog, there are many more still relying on newspaper ads and referrals to drum up business.

With that in mind, kudos to Century 21 for launching an online video campaign called Dig the Digs.

On paper this idea pops: Century 21 agents team with their clients to create a two-minute video about the home they’re selling and then upload it to the company’s branded YouTube channel.

Once all submissions are in, YouTube viewers vote for their favorites. The top 10 vote-getters are announced and a panel of Century 21 employees chooses a winner. The winning homeowner gets $21,000.

More than 52 people submitted videos, surpassing the company’s goal. While some of these amateur efforts offer a bit of quirky charm, most fall short of that special something that makes a video go viral.

That how marketers and robots think real people talk