You love Facebook. You love your friends. You love burgers. But what if Burger King offers you a free Whopper if you delete 10 friends from your Facebook network? That’s what Burger King – fast invading the viral world of online, first with their Whopper Virgins campaign and now this – is now promoting: The Whopper Sacrifice.
“You like your friends, but you love the WHOPPER. What would you do for a free whopper? Now is the time to put your fair-weather web friendships to the test. Install WHOPPER Sacrifice on your Facebook profile, and we’ll reward you with a free flame-broiled WHOPPER when you sacrifice 10 of your friends.”
– quoted from the website
Yes, you read that right. Install the app on Facebook, delete 10 of your friends, and get a free burger. I think this is a cheeky, conversation-provoking social media campaign by Burger King. Not only does it address the awkward Facebook phenomenon of having “friends” who are not really your friends (you can use the whopper as an excuse to sacrifice them!), it also embeds the Whopper brand into the consumer’s daily life in a funny way (or offensive, depending on how you look at it. Imagine how you would feel if you got deleted for a burger…) The “sacrifices” also show up on your News Feed: “Bianca sacrificed Shane Kelly for a free Whopper.” (Peace, Shane!) You can also become a Fan of the Sacrfice Page. So in the end, Burger King actually promotes socializing with this campaign. And no doubt, it’s gaining a lot of publicity and use already. But the real question is – how will this affect the brand in the long run? Think about it, and while you’re at it, decide if your love for your friends is bigger than your love for the Whopper – if not, have fun doing the sacrifices!
You can download the app from Facebook or from the Whopper Sacrifice website.
UPDATE: Burger King has decided to “sacrifice” this Whopper Application. According to an article on AdAge, the app was apparently violating some of Facebook’s standards/user expectations, as it “was essentially singling out users for ridicule.” Now if you go to the Facebook page there is note that says “Facebook has disabled Whopper sacrifice after your love for the Whopper sandwich proved to stronger than 233,906 friendships.” In my opinion, the good news for Burger King is that this creates even more controversy/publicity. The bad news is that more than 200,000 friends have been dropped for one-tenth of a burger… What do you think??
