What Zetterberg Does At Home

Some people love Twittering. Some people love Facebooking. Others love blogging. I'm one of the latter people, but I also love receiving emails. Don't get me wrong - I use my phone and write letters by hand as well, but a good email brings a smile to my face. A good email can be a number of things: a friend saying "hello", a funny picture or video, or, in the case of this blog, an email about something cool in the hockey world. And I am happy to report that the latest email I received from a reader contains two of those things that make a good email, and I'm hoping to turn it into all three things.

I was a little apprehensive to open Jakob Hawkins' email today about a commercial as I suspected it might be spam, but I'm glad I did. Jakob, and his Detroit-based friend named Greg DeLiso, decided to take marketing for the NHL to a whole new level. Granted, neither of these men don't have any affiliation with the NHL, it's marketing partners, or its franchises, but they are doing something that could be the next big wave in marketing the NHL: they are producing their own commercials.

We've seen other people bring to light their Do-It-Yourself projects, and the results have been pretty good. What Jakob and Greg have done, however, is spectacular.

I'll let you read through Jakob's email to me before you get to the goods. Of course, you can skip past this and head right to the embedded video if you want, but you'll miss the entire premise behind this endeavor, and it's this premise that makes this project so cool. Here we go:

OK. So here’s the deal. A few months ago my friend Greg, a Detroit native, and I were sitting around, hanging out when he remarked how much I really look like Henrik Zetterberg. I had heard this a few times before but neither of us had really put much thought into it. About a week or so later, I had an idea while riding the subway. You see, Greg and I both live in NYC, I’m an actor and he’s a filmmaker. It dawned on me that we should shoot something with me as Zetterberg...

The more the two of us talked, the more we figured out that we both had problems with the current NHL marketing campaign, and who better to come up with some new commercials than us. So, we set off scripting a series of commercials, storyboarding them with artist friends of ours, putting together presentation packets, and then shooting and editing several commercials. We created an entire advertising campaign for NHL. Once we had all of our stuff put together we realized that we needed to get our stuff to them…

Well, the first part turned out to be the easy part. Using just about every connection we had, we ended up getting the material to a few people who said they would “pass it along” at the NHL. Well, as many of us know, rarely does this make for a sure bet.

After a few weeks, we again came to another realization. If you want to get someone’s attention, it’s a lot easier if you have a thousand, or ten thousand, or a hundred thousand people with you.

SO HERE WE ARE, we want to bring it to the people. LET THE PEOPLE DECIDE! If the people think it works, then a message will get sent to the NHL that IT DOES WORK!

This is our first video made specifically for the playoff run to the Stanley Cup.

The concept involves a hapless Zetterberg doppelganger going about his daily life in hockey gear. YES, FULL UNIFORM! He eats, sleeps, and bathes like this. The follow up commercials we are planning to release soon include going on a job interview, fighting pollution, taking a guitar lesson and many more to come. With a little help, we will be able to show the NHL the full scope of our campaign which goes far beyond just Zetterberg and the Redwings.

This is us, the little guy, average Joe, David. Not trying to take down Goliath, but just trying to let him know that we are here. That sometimes to find out what the people want, you should just go to the people. We know what we like.

Thank you.

Go Zetterberg! Go Redwings! Go HOCKEY!

Jakob Hawkins & Greg DeLiso

So now that you know why they are doing it, take a look at what they are doing:

Pretty cool for a couple of amateurs, right? Yes, it doesn't have the big-budget NHL dollars behind it, but it really hits home. It's funny, it's goofy, and it goes to show that NHL players are really like you and me. That's effective marketing when it comes to forging a bond between millionaire athlete and blue-collar fan.

I've emailed Mr. Hawkins back with the request that he keeps my email handy upon the publication of his next video. If you like the video, please leave a comment on the YouTube site, or drop me a line and I'll pass on your praise for Jakob and Greg's work.

Who knows? Maybe they'll be running next season's marketing campaign for the NHL.

Huge thumbs-up from this writer, gentlemen. I loved the commercial, and can't wait to see the next one.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!