The program was powered by Vivoom, which helps brands activate existing customers by adding branding elements to user-generated content for a shared media ad format. Based on the success of the effort, Microsoft will repeat the effort the Office in the fall as well as launch Vivoom-enabled campaigns targeting customers of Xbox and Surface. 

?Shared media delivers the highest quality of mobile views,? said Katherine Hays, CEO of Vivoom. ?When brands buy mobile views, they want them to be full screen, relevant and trusted. 

?Brands want them to be watched with audio, don?t want them skipped over quickly or blocked by ad blockers,? she said. ?Shared media achieves all of these results.?

The campaign was designed to engage consumers on mobile while driving awareness of and sales for Microsoft Office. 

Best Buy employees were invited to create a video highlighting their favorite features of Office, with branded filters automatically added. Employees could then see a preview of their video and share via social, email and text. 

The employees? videos were up to 15 seconds long and were full-screen, with viewers seeing a brief introduction from Microsoft and Best Buy, branded elements during the video and a conclusion with the embedded call to action. 

Below the video, a banner highlighted a campaign hashtag, #OfficeOverachiever, and an offer to save $20 on Office at Best Buy with the purchase of a new PC, Mac, Surface, iPad or select phones. Clicking on the Learn More button brought viewers to a page with details about the offer and a list of eligible items that could be added to a cart. 

The results include that 1.5 percent of eligible Best Buy employees created and shared a video, with each receiving an average of 285 unique views, with 65 percent viewed to completion. 

Additionally, 3.9 percent clicked to download a coupon for Office and 2.3 percent redeemed the coupon and purchased at a Best Buy store. 

With traditional mobile advertising, marketers pay to target a publisher?s audience. However, there is evidence that this strategy ? which is how advertising has traditionally worked ? faces challenges on mobile, which is a much more personal device. Mobile users are regularly muting video ads, expressing their annoyance with pre-roll ads and adopting ad blockers to reduce the interruptions. 

Vivoom?s platform enables brands such as Microsoft to co-create videos with their existing customers. In its first campaign with Best Buy, Microsoft chose to have the retailer?s employees create videos and share them out. However, the follow-up efforts will encourage Xbox and Surface customer to create content. 

A key point of differentiation for Vivoom is that brands can activate their existing customers and build from their existing efforts with on social media and with apps. Depending upon how large a mobile social audience a brand already has, this can represent a brand?s best prospects for revenue growth, per Ms. Hayes. 

Virtually all of the Vivoom videos from customers of brands such L?Oreal, Lilly Pulitzer, Cheerio?s and others, are being created on mobile and the vast majority are also viewed on mobile. 

The success of Snapchat with branded lenses and filters shows that mobile users are interested in creating and sharing content with brands.  

With Vivoom, similar shared media ad campaigns can target broader segments across numerous social media networks without requiring a traditional media buy. 

?Consumers respond because it is coming from a friend and is not intrusive,? Ms. Hays said. ?Rather than interrupt the conversion, it allows the brand to join the conversation in a way that is on message.?