These Yoox deals will self-destruct in 15 seconds

Purses in perilous predicaments and shoes in serious scenarios aim to grab the attention of decisive shoppers in a new YouTube pre-roll campaign for online retailer Yoox.

With the tagline 'Skip it and you'll miss it', the 25-second shoppable ads give viewers 15 seconds to save an item from devious (yet delightful) methods of destruction, including burning by lasers, crushing by hydraulic press and incineration by lava.

Despite the funny mayhem, the admonishment to act now is no joke. The brand insists that once the deal expires, that particular user will never be able to find it on the Yoox site, nor watch the video again on YouTube.

Presumably no luxury items were actually harmed during the making of these ads, because thankfully the camera cuts away before the actual violence ensues. Moreover, the brand says that if one viewer fails to click, another person will get the chance to rescue that particular item.

The brand worked with Google and Stink Studios on the project, and the ads are running in US, Italy, Japan, and South Korea until mid-December. Stink Studios is using a proprietary real-time cloud-rendering platform to integrate the images and text pertaining to the specific items into the Rube Goldberg-esque animations.

“This campaign is proving that it is possible to run a branding campaign with performance tools, thus integrating a full funnel strategy which appeals to both awareness and purchase intent," Simone Zucca, fashion and retail sector leader at Google Italy, said in a release. "It is brandformance at its best."

Campaign's comments: We are always happy to see advertisers and agencies using the technical tools at their disposal to evolve their creative approaches. True innovation in the pre-roll format remains surprisingly rare, with too many brands still doing nothing more than shoveling television ads into those spots. This campaign's clever mechanism thus becomes a good example for others to aspire to. That said, we wonder whether there's potential for a backfire effect among users who don't act quite quickly enough to grab the deals and then get annoyed that they can't find them anymore. It will be interesting to see how that enforced scarcity plays out. 

CREDITS

Creative Lead Google ZOO: Andreas Mielenhausen & Luiz Risi
Creative and production : Stink Studios
Client: Filippo Vezzali, Creative Director YOOX