US National Guard Invades the Internet
by Damian Burke
For some or other bizarre reason, I was watching videos for US National Guard recruitment yesterday, and decided to take a look at the recruitment website to see how they marketed themselves – specifically through the use of extramural media. After all, it’s a tricky thing to sell these days.
After browsing the site for only a few minutes I realised that the website was rather well orchestrated. From the word go, the site used every angle to cover every base. For instance, the URL cleverly includes the recruitment telephone number and a call to action (www.1-800-go-guard.com).
The site features:
- National Guard themed movies
- A 3 Doors Down music video tribute, Citizen Soldier (the YouTube version of which has been viewed 42,287 times in two weeks)
- A one on one chat option with a “Hero on Call”
- Forums for past, present and future soldiers
- Top 100 high school football rankings
- Event guides, including Guard Fishing and Racing events
- Emotive CTAs (focusing on education, money, adventure and freedom)
- Other miscellaneous downloads (screensavers etc.)
The site includes every bell and whistle available, except a blog - oddly. It even includes a content personalisation function. The settings options include Active Duty, Warrant Officer, College Student, Parent and even Clergy. These options (and more) display content aimed specifically at that wedge of the pie. The FAQ sections, for instance, are customised to each personalised setting.
My favourite element of the site is the section called HOOAH! In essence, users need to scour the website for answers to questions. Each question answered correctly earns them HOOAH! points which can be redeemed for US National Guard caps, shirts, water bottles, DVDs and even candy a striped football.
It must be difficult to market army recruitment in the spotlight these days, but I think they’ve done a pretty good job.
I just don't understand why they don’t have a blog; perhaps they think this blog business is just a bunch of HOOAH!
Comments
post a commentThat's true.
They also blocked all social media in Iraq, claiming it "took up too much bandwidth".
Posted by Damian on 2007/11/15
I think it was a smart choice. War is not pretty but every country needs national security. Imagine if the whole army went AWOL based on the opinions of a few soldiers. We would not be touting for free media then.
Posted by Chewbacca on 2007/11/20
Well Chewbacca...the US has already gone to war based on the opinion of a "few politicians and high ranking army folk". The fed the public some info on nukes in Iraq to get them on their side.This was completely false.
Point is that the soldiers felt they were lied to and this was not part of the agreement they had with their employer "The United States Army".
The fact that "War is not Pretty" just does not suffice when you have to kill hundreds of people over a lie! Good on them for blogging and showing that not all orders should be followed without thinking.
Posted by Smallz on 2007/11/20
I also read this morning that they're planning to make injured vets repay signing bonuses because they cannot fulfill their obligation.
Now that is sickening.
http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2007/11/20/vets/index.html
Posted by Damian on 2007/11/21
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The US sure has done a pretty good job of internet army recruitment. They know where the "young men and women" are consuming media these days and Uncle Tom has learnt the wise ways of Web 2.0.
Regarding the blog, there were some incidents where US soldiers returning from Iraq blogged about how disillusioned they were about that particular war. They felt they were misled. The result was that some of them faced a court marshall for something like "conduct unbecoming of a soldier blah, blah blah. Result is that the US army does not look to kindly on soldiers blogging and has probably banned the use of it.
Posted by Smallz on 2007/11/15