Viral Marketing Initiatives

How Burger King made a viral classic out of a classic jingle.

Let’s be honest, asking me to talk about viral campaigns is like asking me to bake a 5 layer chocolate cake – I know what one looks like, but I’m not entirely sure where to start.  After all, there is a reason why this blog is titled “Social Media Marketing from a Beginner’s Perspective”.   

Instead, I turned to my resident expert on the subject – my son.  As an adult male age 18-25, he has spent a good portion of his life on the internet and social media. So I asked him to recommend a good example of a viral marketing campaign that he has seen recently.

He immediately suggested the Whopper, Whopper song, released by Burger King in early 2023 as part of Burger King’s “You Rule” campaign.

The ad campaign from Burger King was designed to bring back the idea of “Having it Your Way”, a successful slogan from the 70s for the brand.  The updated version uses the same music, with simplified words and graphics in a 15 and 30 second version.  The ads were run on television, and were also available for sharing and download from YouTube.    

Within just four months, the YouTube version has been viewed over 7.1 Million times. As the popularity grew, Burger King followed it up with a Spotify album that was downloaded 50,000 times in the first weekend.

So what about the Whopper, Whopper campaign made it a become a viral success?

It invited creativity and interactivity. While Burger King did not overtly tell people to create their own content from the original ad, they made it very easy for people to do so.  In fact, Burger King uploaded a karaoke version to TikTok to make it even easier for fans.   

It was easy to share. In this case, the original video was not the target of the sharing.  Having users post their own content and share it on their channel was the goal was the target, which they did. 

It evoked an emotion.  Anyone who watched television during the time when the original ads ran remembers the words to the original “Have it You Way” jingle.  The nostalgia created by reusing the music from that old jingle absolutely created an emotional response.    

It had good timing. The original ads were played on tv during the height of NFL football season, when captive audiences and frequent commercial breaks led to the ad being seen multiple times during the games. 

So will this version of the Burger King song have the enduring popularity of the original?  Only time will tell.