viral attempt too little too late

Just this week, I saw a TV commercial for Sounds of Beer.com.  There was lots of burping and belching, and a plea for you to add your “voice” to the growing stack of sounds.  My inner 15-year-old giggled, I made a mental note to give it a look sometime, and I went on with my life.

Then on Wednesday, I got an email saying that the SOB website is related to the Florida Aquarium.  Of course, I had to go find out the story behind Sounds Of Beer.  Turns out it’s a campaign to get us all to go to SudsFest 2009, an annual fundraiser featuring craft beer from breweries all over the world, food from local area restaurants, and other entertainment at the Florida Aquarium in downtown Tampa.

It makes sense to me.  People are encouraged to make their own, uh, “beer sounds” and upload to YouTube.  The SOBs check ‘em out, and then pick a bunch to show on the SOB website – all in all, a pretty good viral marketing idea.  To help push it, they made up a facebook page (59 fans), and a twitter account (58 followers), too.

The problem is that it looks like the campaign just started moving on June 2.  SudsFest 2009 is Saturday, June 13.  Viral campaigns can work pretty fast, but I’m not sure 10 days is enough time to really build a buzz about it.

I hope it works out for the Aquarium.