ilovebees: An Example of Viral Marketing

ilovebees was a marketing campaign for the release of 'Halo 2' a highly anticipated video game. It took the form of an Alternate Reality Game, or 'ARG'. Typically these games see people from all over the world working together to harvest information from fake websites. They generate an unbelievable amount of publicity, and really draw the participants into the world of the product that they are publicising.

ilovebees was a cross-media experience that drew on the internet for the production of fake websites, as well as emailing, and even phone communication with characters from the game world. The game sparked interest when the url 'www.ilovebees.com' was displayed at the end of an early trailer for Halo 2. From here, players of the game unravelled the secrets held within that site and many others to reveal a complicated story full of twists and turns. The ultimate payoff of the game is that participants were invited to special locations to play the game before it was released to the public.