What’s VoIP kingpin Skype to do when it needs to promote its premium group video-calling feature to non-subscribers?

The content marketing minds at the company huddled up, then invented an e-greeting app that anyone can use, from anywhere, to compose a personalized video message and send it along to friends.

These are actually v-greeting cards.

Say it With Skype users make videos — but not just any old videos. These videos star the recording artists you choose. They can star you, too (provided you’re not camera shy).

A birthday edition came first. Viewers were given the opportunity to sing or play along with Grammy winner Imogen Heap, Texas pop-punkers Bowling for Soup, or 11 other acts they might want to jam in their friends’ ears. A variety of greetings followed for holidays, including a take on “We Wish You a Merry Christmas,” by Alice Cooper (who’s seldom mistaken for Bing Crosby).

You rock…

Care to simply tell someone “you rock?” That might go something like this… (click to the image below to play this Say it With Skype sample.)

Play this program

Say It with Skype caught on fast and earned widespread media coverage around the world. In the podcast below, I present 15 informative minutes with Skype’s Global Senior Social Media Marketing Manager Leanne Johnson. Listen and learn:

• How users create and share personalized videos
• What went into, and came out of, the minds of the Skype marketing team
• Skype’s quest to “move the needle” in the social space
• How the artsy app doubles as a demo
• The public’s response to the program and accolades it’s earned
• How the content program continues to evolve and expand

• http://www.skype.com/intl/en/features/allfeatures/group-video-calls/sayitwithskype/
• http://blogs.skype.com/en/2011/11/say_it_with_skype.html

Music courtesy of and created by Robert Rose, CMI consultant, author, rocker & recording artist.