In the US, 8.3 billion views were generated by branded content in 2013. It's estimated branded entertainment was up 44% from the previous year. So clearly a growing, increasingly competitive area and one you need to stand out in to succeed.

We created a series of spoof golf tutorials which absurdly teach you how to play golf when there’s an alligator on the course. They were made to be very low-fi and similar in style to the YouTube golf tutorials that are so popular among our target audience. The videos were found on both Zurich’s golf microsite and YouYube and were promoted by search, pre-rolls and tweets by golf pros who are Zurich brand ambassadors. The idea was to give golf fans something that plays with a world they love, to get them talking and sharing.

Gator Golf was launched in the lead up to the PGA Zurich Classic. We got more than 20 million media impressions in just 10 days. Golf fans talked about it on social media. Compared to last year’s Classic, Zurich Insurance’s online activity went up over 900%. Zurich’s golf microsite reported a 2981% upturn in traffic right after Gator Golf was launched. All this from six YouTube golf tutorials shot in half a day with one actor and a fake alligator.