System Administrators (or SysAdmins) are the guys who keep company’s networks, systems and PCs going. In their eyes, they are the real heroes and everyone else just gets in the way.
Sun wanted to get to know them better and help them learn more about Sun and its products – but without doing it overtly. We therefore set up www.systemheroes.co.uk, an unbranded, irreverent website where System Administrators could get together, let off steam and have some fun.
Visually, it’s a bit rough and ready and it has a deliberately colloquial tone of voice. The site contains a mixture of serious and non-serious content, including blogs from Sun experts and fellow SysAdmins, cartoons, games and spoof ads. It’s a very different proposition from Sun’s traditional offerings.
Traffic is steered to the site via simple, intriguing emails and devices such as Google Gadget ads. The first email registered an open rate of 19% and a click/through to open rate of 53.7%. There are currently over 350 registered System Heroes on the site.
The campaign won us the Best Customer Initiative Award at the 2008 B2B Marketing Awards.
We were recently tasked with modifying System Heroes’ perceptions of Sun’s Solaris operating system, so we rose to the challenge with a tongue-in-cheek Solaris vs Linux quiz. Designed to help respondents determine whether they’re a Sun Worshipper (with a preference for Solaris) or a Chilly Penguin (the logo that represents competitor Linux), the visually entertaining quiz generated an unprecedented response, with over 1,500 completes over its first weekend alone.
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Zola's our Rhodesian Ridgeback who cruises our barn from 9 to 5. We fitted her with a webcam to find out what she really gets up to.
See her view of the world at Flickr or follow her on her very own Twitter page.