SA’s ‘Tokoloshe’ online video campaign is pure genius

Check this out. It’s one of the best online video campaigns we’ve seen in a while.

Except, if you’d seen the first video, you probably wouldn’t have even been aware that it was advertising anything, much less a new player in the South African online property space.

The teaser ad for Tivvit.com, comes in the form of a news story purporting to show a man who had filmed a Tokoloshe breaking into his house. In order to make it seem more legitimate the teaser featured filmed cell phone footage, a news report, and the news reader in studio, screened that material on a TV and filmed the ‘broadcast’ off another cellphone, including PVR watermarks.

These finer details were reportedly included to help ensure that people focused on the Tokoloshe instead. From there, it was seeded to two prominent bloggers. These elements combined saw it hit 60 000 organic views on YouTube and 117 likes. It’s no Buck Norris sure, but it’s not bad for a campaign that, at the end of the day, is all about property.

Tivvit was then able to go public with the campaign, including a shortened version of the Tokoloshe news story with a branded ending.

The agency behind the campaign says it is intended to be fun. In this spirit, a few more videos have been released, all based on scenarios of why people would want to move.

“There are endless hilarious, scary, bizarre and ridiculous reasons why someone would need to move house and these are just the first of many ads depicting some of them,” it says.