Where to begin? Not in our wildest dreams could we have imagined that our video of 3 guys Irish dancing around the world would have created such a stir both at home and abroad. Since the video was uploaded to YouTube on Tuesday morning at 9am everything has just spiralled out of control.
The video itself was part of The Wirld project that we undertook to promote Ireland to young people during our round the world trip. We had hoped that it would be shared amongst family and friends but didn’t for a moment think it could have gone as viral as it did. To be honest, since the video has been online I have barely left my house as we’ve been inundated with calls and emails from not only media outlets but also people living abroad who have discovered a new found interest in the Emerald Isle.
The snowball affect really kicked off on Tuesday with numerous Irish media outlets sharing the video on their Facebook pages which led to thousands of people seeing it within the first few hours. This led to a number of radio interviews the following morning, most notably on 2FM with Ryan Tubridy which went rather well given the nerves in The Wirld HQ. We also did interviews with the BBC, iRadio and Radio Nova. As the views were racking up the video began getting noticed by established websites both in Ireland and around the world. We appeared on Mashable, Huffington Post, The Irish Independent and The Daily Mail to name but a few. It was also on Wednesday that we got the big call from RTE about appearing on the Late Late show which was pretty crazy. I had always imagined my first appearance on it would be with a boy band…but hey dreams change.
The video itself was part of The Wirld project that we undertook to promote Ireland to young people during our round the world trip. We had hoped that it would be shared amongst family and friends but didn’t for a moment think it could have gone as viral as it did. To be honest, since the video has been online I have barely left my house as we’ve been inundated with calls and emails from not only media outlets but also people living abroad who have discovered a new found interest in the Emerald Isle.
The snowball affect really kicked off on Tuesday with numerous Irish media outlets sharing the video on their Facebook pages which led to thousands of people seeing it within the first few hours. This led to a number of radio interviews the following morning, most notably on 2FM with Ryan Tubridy which went rather well given the nerves in The Wirld HQ. We also did interviews with the BBC, iRadio and Radio Nova. As the views were racking up the video began getting noticed by established websites both in Ireland and around the world. We appeared on Mashable, Huffington Post, The Irish Independent and The Daily Mail to name but a few. It was also on Wednesday that we got the big call from RTE about appearing on the Late Late show which was pretty crazy. I had always imagined my first appearance on it would be with a boy band…but hey dreams change.
Thursday and Friday morning both had more of the same with a few more interviews for newspapers and radio stations as the view count shot past 250,000. But it was in the afternoon of Friday that we had our U2 moment. The Wirld version of the Joshua Tree broke the US, as we appeared on TV for the Good Morning America breakfast show which is aired to millions. The music was altered on the video however, which would be like watching MTV and seeing the video of “With or without you” with the audio of “Bananas in pyjamas”. But any publicity is good publicity I suppose!
Foreign Press
The Late Late show itself was a great experience. After our brief interview at the start of the show with Ryan we spent the next 3 hours in the Green Room with fellow guests Louis Walsh, Bill O’Herlihy and Conor McGregor with the odd alcoholic beverage in tow. We tried to peddle the idea of our boy band to Louis but he didn’t seem too interested as he said he would chat with us about it later and then we never saw him again! At around 1am, we headed into town trying to milk our 15 seconds of fame. Turns out nobody in Coppers watches the Late Late show. Typical!
As the view count was rising on Saturday we began featuring in more articles in South America and Asia which is great given that this was our focus for the majority of the trip. The video seems to be very popular, particularly in South America, so fingers crossed it leads to some people coming to visit our shores in the near future.
But to be honest the most important thing for us this week has been the feedback from people to the video. 99% of all comments for the video, be it on YouTube or an article published by a news agency have been extremely positive. People have understood that it is a bit of craic and that obviously we are not the best dancers in the world but have admired the effort. That is apart from a few keyboard warriors of course, but they are everywhere. So a big thanks to everyone for all the nice comments.
Over the past few days people have kept asking have we made anything out of the video going viral, and the answer in monetary terms is no, but that was never the aim at The Wirld. The sole aim of the trip was to promote Ireland amongst a demographic that perhaps didn’t know an awful lot about Ireland before. These young people we met (and many more we didn’t) are sharing this video amongst their peers and creating a buzz and interest about Ireland that didn’t exist before. So when people ask did we get anything from it? Yes, we got exactly what we wanted. Oh and also the feeling of being celebs for 4 days!
So a final thanks to everyone for sharing the video all over the world and spreading the word of how great this country is. Without doubt, the world has become a lot more Irish.
The Lads
But to be honest the most important thing for us this week has been the feedback from people to the video. 99% of all comments for the video, be it on YouTube or an article published by a news agency have been extremely positive. People have understood that it is a bit of craic and that obviously we are not the best dancers in the world but have admired the effort. That is apart from a few keyboard warriors of course, but they are everywhere. So a big thanks to everyone for all the nice comments.
Over the past few days people have kept asking have we made anything out of the video going viral, and the answer in monetary terms is no, but that was never the aim at The Wirld. The sole aim of the trip was to promote Ireland amongst a demographic that perhaps didn’t know an awful lot about Ireland before. These young people we met (and many more we didn’t) are sharing this video amongst their peers and creating a buzz and interest about Ireland that didn’t exist before. So when people ask did we get anything from it? Yes, we got exactly what we wanted. Oh and also the feeling of being celebs for 4 days!
So a final thanks to everyone for sharing the video all over the world and spreading the word of how great this country is. Without doubt, the world has become a lot more Irish.
The Lads
