By now, I’m pretty sure most internet-users have heard of the Kony 2012. The insanely successful viral campaign launched by Invisible Children has achieved over 82 million views in the matter of three weeks on YouTube alone.

Watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4MnpzG5Sqc

The campaign’s premise is the make Joseph Kony famous. Kony is a Ugandan war lord who is wanted by the International Court for crimes against humanity. This year, Invisible Children wants the world to know about Kony and to finally catch him. The execution and strategy is excellent. A well-produced video presenting facts and appealing to emotions (by featuring children who escaped Kony) captured people’s attention, while the strategy of getting normal people to tweet/contact ‘influencers’ such as Rihanna, Stephen Colbert and   various politicians.

Hours after it was launched, Kony hashtags dominated twitter, and #kony2012 trended worldwide for three entire days. Years ago, the mass public generally had no say in what the senior politicians and businessmen were deciding. Now, because of social media, the pyramid has turned around, and the general public is now influencing the government. Kony 2012 is harvesting this exact phenomenon by using the millions of everyday people to influence and put pressure on the ‘influencers’

Strategically, Kony 2012 is one of the best online marketing campaigns I’ve seen.