Two of my favorite YouTubers, Grace Helbig and Mamrie Hart,
did exactly what my title says over this past summer. They road tripped around
the United States with social media as their guide and HeyUSA was born.
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| http://www.tubefilter.com/2014/06/26/grace-helbig-mamrie-hart-hey-usa-astronauts-wanted/ |
Helbig and Hart took to Twitter, Tumblr and YouTube comments
as to what destinations they should visit. The cities that got the most social
media buzz would be featured on the show. The two women travelled to Portland,
New Orleans, Provincetown and Louisville, to
name a few.
Over the summer, they filmed and posted three “teaser” episodes
to YouTube for each of their stops. These individual teasers just focused on
one of the many activities they did at each destination. At the end of each teaser,
they promised the full episodes of HeyUSA would be available in October
and released all at once so you can ‘binge-watch’ them all at once.
Helbig and Hart kept their promise. On October 15,
all eight episodes of HeyUSA were uploaded and ready for binge-watching. I am
guilty of wasting a whole afternoon watching these episodes straight through.
Of course, from the end of August until the release date,
they kept their social media followers’ interest piqued with throwback Thursday
Instagram photos from their time filming the show, links back to the teaser episodes
and funny quotes we didn’t hear in the teasers. During the episodes, they
would have a special guest (usually another YouTuber) and do a Q-and-A/Trivia with them
using questions from Twitter. Helbig and Hart even met up with some of their
biggest fans they met through social media.
These two women are social media queens. But, that’s kind of
their job. They are basically professional YouTubers. So, they engaged their
fans, followers and the YouTube groundswell in a very unique way and built a
whole travel show around it. Helbig and Hart used social media in all stages of
this project, which made it so much more personal, in my opinion. I highly
recommend watching this series if you are a Grace Helbig or a Mamrie Hart fan…or
you just like puns.
Kelly,
ReplyDeleteI have never heard of Grace Helbig and Mamrie Hart until reading your blog post about their HeyUSA tour. You are right; they sound like social media geniuses. I am always amazed when I hear how normal people have managed to make themselves "YouTube famous." Sometimes I try and think of clever ways I could use YouTube and nothing ever comes to mind. It really does take a special combination of social media knowledge, creativity and charisma to do something like Helbig and Hart. Hats off to them for their success with the HeyUSA tour.