Fast reaction with personalized videos through social media - Old Spice smells like great success

When advertising through social media, being quick is essential. There are not many companies that are fast and at the same time deliver appealing content. A company that was able to do so is Old Spice - with advertising for deodorant and body wash for men. Old Spice belongs to the Procter&Gamble group.

The clip „The Man your Man Could Smell Like“ by Old Spice with Isaiah Mustafa was first published on Youtube on February 2nd, 2010 and has had almost 15 million viewers since then. On June 29, 2010, the Clip „Questions“ was added. As the actor from the clip tells in an interview, the entire clip is one single shot without any CGI (computer-generated imagery). To build the set in Vallermo, California, took several days.

A week ago, an Old Spice hype started, as the company added personalized videos to its Youtube channel OldSpice. The "Old Spice Guy" from the commercials answered questions and responded to tweets - topless and just with a towel around the waste. Even conversations and flirts between him via video and (female) users via Twitter started. The Old Spice guy answered to random questions from users - almost in real time. Within 24 hours, more than 150 videos were created.

The video responses are between 20 and 60 seconds long and react to the users' comments (Tweets, Youtube comments, blog articles, facebook comments, reddit comments and others). The responses contain a lot of charm and humor and are also sexy.
Very funny are the video responses to the twitter question of @isaiahmustafa, the actor who plays Old Spice guy or also the question of Haley Mustafa (the actor's daughter) who wants to know why Old Spice guy looks so much like her dad.
One questions however remains: who is the actual target group of the Old Spice commercials?
Old Guy certainly speaks to the "ladies". Nevertheless, the products are for men. For sure, Old Spice guy is every woman's darling - maybe guys should become jealous? Or it speaks to women who should then go and buy Old Spice products for their men?