This year’s B2B Marketing awards held last week in London, saw Bristol-based digital viral agency Rebel Virals walk away with the accolade for ‘Best Channel Marketing Initiative.’ The win proves yet again that Bristol’s creative industry has the skills to compete with its London rivals.



Adam Etheridge, joint managing director with James Trezona, said: “Winning a top industry award is a great feeling, and it’s always good to know that the hard work we put in at Bristol is recognised on a national scale.”



The award-winning viral campaign, produced for Microsoft and their Partner Community, used viral video content to alert and drive channel partners to the newly vamped Microsoft Partner Community site. Here they were prompted to sign up and join the network.



James added: “The viral medium is really coming of age in the business-to-business environment; businesses can now see strong evidence of the power behind really good creative and strategic viral marketing.”



Set at the fictitious ‘Camp Network’ obstacle course, the viral video spoofs a networking and team building exercise. Uninspired partners are cajoled into climbing the “profitability ladder”, leveraging “the power triangle” and building “the revenue raft”. A huge hit with Microsoft partners, within a month the video attracted more than 15,000 new visitors to the Partner Community site – a social space for partners to discuss projects, make new contacts and support each other – and accounted for more than 1,300 new site registrations.



Clare Barclay, Director of Strategy and Programmes, Microsoft UK, said: “The Partner Community is a Web 2.0-rich service and we wanted the promotional drive to reflect that. It’s great we’ve been able to provide partners with a useful networking tool at the same time as entertain them!”



Digital viral agency Rebel Virals is a joint venture between integrated marketing agency Mason Zimbler and video marketing specialists Aspect Film and Video. Rebel Virals delivers the full viral package to B2B technology clients, including strategic planning, film production, seeding and analysis. Its mission is to spur engagement between people and brands, sparking activity and advocacy.

www.rebelvirals.com