Boosted Boards: Rolling Through YouTube Into The Public Eye

Rolling around on a skateboard is a right of passage for most children growing up in North America, many of them dreaming of becoming the next Tony Hawk, or Nyjah Huston. While many of these people will never attain these goals, they will still have a blast pushing around town on their boards.

Skateboarding is a wonderful tool for transportation, but it has a few key limitations. The main problem is hills, and everyone who has ever stepped on a skateboard has a deep fear of the dreaded “speed wobble“. While going down a hill on a skateboard, you don’t have many options for braking and going up hills is also an issue, as it becomes a battle against gravity. Boosted Board is a company that was founded to improve some of the issues that have plagued skaters for years. Boosted Board is an electric skateboard controlled by a small handheld remote. You can adjust your speed and even brake! Skateboarders everywhere now have a solution to some of their problems. Boosted Boards has turned to social media to showcase their product to the skateboarders of the world and get everyone skateboarding again.

One user who found Boosted Boards is a massively popular filmmaker named Casey Neistat. Casey lives in the densely populated Manhattan, where getting around the city can be an issue and when he found out about the Boosted Board, he had to buy one. He began using the board to travel around the city and because he is a daily vlogger, millions of people began to see how much fun a Boosted Board can be. Not wanting to miss out on a marketing opportunity Boosted Board and Casey got in contact and soon after they brought him on in an advisory capacity. This ensured that Boosted Boards could keep being featured in a popular internet show, while Casey could receive benefits like testing out prototypes of new models. After Casey started surfing around New York City on his new wheels, it didn’t take long for Boosted Board to spread all over the world of YouTube.

While Casey’s videos feature Boosted Boards as a simple mode of transportation, other YouTubers began to create films with the board as a centrepiece. Jesse Wellens, a friend of Casey’s, filmed a video for Halloween where he dressed up as Aladdin and placed a carpet over the board. The motorized skateboard allowed him to create the illusion of floating around the city on a magic carpet and the hilarious video exploded in popularity. Jesse also runs a popular vlog channel where he documents his daily life, which involves a lot of riding around Philadelphia on a Boosted Board. Boosted Board has been placed on a massive pedestal by these YouTube creators who constantly push the product without directly selling it to the audience. Their enthusiasm for the product is clear and their fans are more likely to buy a board as a result. The trust forged when you watch someone every day is analogous to a friend telling you to try out a product.

While the company has a huge amount of exposure through the videos of YouTube celebrities, Boosted Boards have other strategies of marketing that don’t involve YouTube. Chris of Boosted Boards gave a short comment about the use of social media for marketing purposes.

Boosted uses social media in order to connect our brand with other brands and influencers that we wish to be aligned with in the public perception.

Boosted Boards holds a ton of events for existing users to meet other friends to ride with. The company frequently posts these events on their Facebook Page. These events serve two purposes; they allow Boosted Boards to keep their customers engaged, while also attracting new customers who want to join in. Having a massive group of people riding electric skateboards together through the streets is a great way to stimulate some buzz in an area. Boosted Boards feature clear branding on the grip tape, as well as very distinct orange wheels and identifying them from other similar products is very easy. These bright colours help identify the product, even when it is soaring past a potential customer at high speeds. The anomaly of seeing a bright orange electric skateboard cruising down a city street will be enough to get a person to seek out what they saw and the distinct branding will help them find what they’re looking for online. Potential customers who have an interest in skateboarding will be excited to join in the community due to the group riding through the area and will likely try to purchase a board or at least follow the company.

Lessons for Others

Boosted Board has done a great job of putting their product in the public eye through the videos of YouTube creators. This exposure gives the company an extreme amounts of views, while not costing the company too much money. While Boosted Boards was discovered organically, other companies should try to get in contact with YouTube creators and partner with them. The YouTube community is a very tight knit one and most viewers trust the creators to be authentic. They are much more likely to accept a product promoted in this fashion, than one pushed in a commercial on TV. Boosted Board also does a great job of cultivating a community for their customers. This is an important lesson for other organizations, as the process keeps old customers happy, and attracts new ones. Most companies, whether they offer a product or a service, could benefit from community building.

If you have concerns as to the accuracy of anything posted on this site, please send your concerns to Peter Carr, Program Director, Social Media for Business Performance.

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