The 10 Best Videos in the History of Video Marketing

The Best Videos in History: The 10 Most Iconic Video Marketing Campaigns

The internet is packed with lists. The 10 best red carpet moments, the 15 best train journeys, the 5 best restaurants… and on it goes. Thousands and thousands of “best of” lists in every possible category. But among all these rankings, we realized something was missing: a list celebrating the history of video marketing — which, let’s be honest, is what really excites us. So, yes… we made a list too. Here’s our roundup of The Best Videos in History when it comes to video marketing, focusing on the game-changers since YouTube exploded onto the scene in 2005 and social media took over the world.

 

The 10 best video marketing campaigns of the last 20 years.

Best? Well, sure, the list has a bit of subjectivity baked in, but these videos are widely admired by marketing pros for their creativity, originality, and — above all — their impact. We’re talking about jaw-dropping YouTube views, massive social buzz, impressive sales results, and more awards than a Hollywood blockbuster.

One last thing before we dive in: the list order is totally random, and no, we didn’t include music videos.

Let’s get to it.

1. Dollar Shave Club. “Our Blades Are F****ing Great”

 

The video that turned Dollar Shave Club into a billion-dollar brand.

In July 2016, Unilever shocked the business world by acquiring Dollar Shave Club for $1 billion — a startup founded just five years earlier by comedian Michael Dubin.

Dubin’s idea? A subscription service delivering razors to your door for just $1 a month. To attract investors and customers, Dubin leaned on his comedy chops and made a hilariously low-budget ($4,500) promo video.

The video kicks off with Dubin asking, “Are our blades any good?” and answering himself: “No — our blades are f***ing great.” Cue 90 seconds of absurd humor: a kid shaving a grown man’s head, jokes about polio, machetes, a clumsy bear… It went viral instantly, pulling in 12,000 orders in just 48 hours — and crashing the website.

Beyond the launch, Dollar Shave Club kept up the funny content, expanding its product line and using cheeky marketing like “Let’s Talk About #2” (for wet wipes) and a quirky print insert called The Bathroom Minutes.

Their success shows the power of hilarious, relatable storytelling — and how killer content can cut through even the most crowded markets.

2. Poo-Pourri. “Girls Don’t Poop”

“You won’t believe the dump I just took.”

A glam woman sitting on the toilet, delivering that line in a posh British accent? Yeah, hard to ignore.

Founder Suzy Batiz had no idea how massive the impact would be when Poo-Pourri launched Girls Don’t Poop in 2013. Sales shot up 90% in one year.

The video took a taboo topic — bathroom odor — and tackled it with humor. The elegant spokesperson delivers blunt talk about, well, pooping, and the contrast is both shocking and hilarious.

The storytelling is sharp, the production is polished, and the message lands perfectly: here’s the problem, here’s the solution, and you’ll laugh all the way to checkout.

Fun fact: originally, the star was supposed to be a British butler. Director Joel Ackerman’s decision to use a woman instead turned out to be genius.

3. Blendtec. “Will It Blend? – iPad”

This video crushed all the records.

If you haven’t seen Will It Blend? – iPad yet, what are you waiting for? Without a doubt, it’s one of the best product demo videos ever made. Why?

Because there’s nothing more convincing than a demonstration — and if that demo is also spectacular and completely unexpected, then you’ve got a bombshell.

And this one really is.

Who wouldn’t want to watch an iPad get turned into dust inside a blender?

Tom Dickson, the genius behind Blendtec, shows us — with a sense of humor and just the right touch of madness — how powerful his blender really is. This isn’t just a sales video, it’s a masterclass in marketing. You stay glued to the screen until the very end, hooked by the perfect mix of science, destruction, and entertainment. By the end, the only question left is: What can’t this blender destroy?

In terms of virality, Will It Blend? is a textbook case. Between YouTube and the official Will It Blend? website, it’s racked up over 100 million views.

The campaign was nominated for the YouTube Award for Best Series in 2007, won Viral Video Campaign of the Year from .Net Magazine the same year, and picked up a Bronze Clio in the Viral Video category in 2008.

 

4. Purple Mattress. “How to Use a Raw Egg to Determine if Your Mattress is Awful.

A brilliant video: how to choose a mattress with eggs.

First surprise: this video is 4 minutes long. “Oh no! A video has to be short, no longer than a minute and a half!” Bullsh*t!

Look at the most repeated YouTube comment: “This is the one ad on YouTube I’ve watched start to finish.” But what’s so special about this explainer video that it has reached 140M views on YouTube?

Let’s think about the context. We’re talking about mattresses. Is there anything more boring and routine? Well, Purple Mattress turns it into something surprising, entertaining, and memorable. That’s already an incredible achievement!

It hooks you from the start: The video begins with a question that immediately grabs you: “How can an egg tell you if your mattress is garbage?” It’s strange, unusual, and sparks curiosity. Capturing attention in the first seconds is crucial, and this video nails it.

Striking visual demonstration: They use eggs to show the mattress’s firmness and support. It’s a simple but extremely effective visual test. The image of an egg that doesn’t break on the Purple mattress, while others turn to mush on conventional mattresses, is clear and powerful. This applies the principle of “show it, don’t just say it.”

Humor and entertainment: It uses characters and ridiculous situations that entertain us while we learn about the product. This humorous touch keeps the audience engaged and makes the video highly shareable.

Clear and direct message: Although the video is entertaining, it never loses sight of its goal: to demonstrate why the Purple mattress is superior. Every element of the video is designed to reinforce that message.

High-quality production: The production quality is excellent, which elevates the perception of the brand.

Effective call to action: It ends with a clear call to action, encouraging viewers to visit their website for more information.

In short, it’s a masterclass in how to take a mundane product and turn it into a visually attractive and emotionally resonant experience. It’s not just a mattress video, it’s a show that entertains and convinces.

5. Squatty Potty. “This Unicorn Changed the Way I Poop”

The video that changed the way 8 million people poop.

A gem from 2015 by the Harmon Brothers. The video explains the benefits of the Squatty Potty, a small plastic stool with a very simple design. It’s used to elevate your legs while you poop. That’s it.

It uses absurd, Monty Python-style humor to surprise and attract viewers while explaining how the Squatty Potty helps achieve an optimal bathroom posture, which leads to better bowel movements.

The result: over 40 million views on YouTube and sales of more than 8 million units by 2022.

The campaign is notable for several reasons:

Humor: Could they have used a different communication tone? Definitely. Would it have been as effective? Definitely not. By using a humorous approach, the video grabs attention and leaves a memorable impression. Humor is perfect for addressing potentially awkward topics.

Narrative: The video has a story structure, starting with the problem (incorrect bathroom posture) and presenting the Squatty Potty as the solution. It helps viewers understand the product’s benefits in an entertaining way.

Virality: The unique and funny content quickly went viral on social media.

Integration of brand elements: The consistent use of brand elements like the unicorn, the prince, and the rainbow ice cream across different platforms reinforces the brand’s identity and message beyond the video itself.

Health education: Besides being entertaining, the video also has an educational role by explaining the health benefits of using the Squatty Potty. This helps build trust and credibility.

The Squatty Potty campaign is a brilliant example of how creative video marketing can transform an ordinary product into a viral sensation, driving massive sales.

6. Metro Trains Melbourne. “Dumb Ways to Die”

The video that saved hundreds of lives.

The Dumb Ways To Die marketing campaign was created in 2012 to highlight the importance of safety in train stations. It’s a public service message for Metro Trains in Melbourne, Australia.

The challenge was to engage young public transport users in a way that would make the message stick in their minds.

In the words of John Mescall, Executive Creative Director at McCann Melbourne, “We decided not to follow an advertising model, but a content model. Both the client and the agency were very determined to make the content good enough to compete with things you’d normally pay for.”

So, they composed a catchy song and made an animated video in which a series of incredibly cute cartoon characters illustrate — well — dumb ways to die. Setting your hair on fire. Sticking a fork in the toaster. Or, of course, falling onto the tracks.

The message? You have to be really dumb to die like that.

They also created print ads and billboards, online games, children’s books distributed in schools across the state, and much more.

The video went viral right away.

In the first 24 hours after its launch, the song Dumb Ways to Die landed in the iTunes Top 10. And in just 48 hours, it reached number 6 in the global singer-songwriter category.

Dumb Ways to Die 2: The Games became the number one app in 90 countries.

But most importantly, it led to a significant reduction in train track accidents.

Twelve years later, the campaign is still going strong, with hundreds of millions of YouTube views, and it remains the most awarded campaign in the history of the Cannes Festival.

The key to Dumb Ways To Die is that it achieves something difficult: maintaining a positive tone while talking about death. It tells mini-stories of charming but very silly characters who put themselves in danger in the dumbest ways. Because they’re animated, there’s a distance from any threat to real people. And on top of that, each character keeps singing and dancing even when their heads explode or their arms fly off — proof that, in their cartoon world, they’re not really dead.

7. UPS. “Freight”

The first whiteboard video in history.

You’ve probably seen these kinds of videos many times, but they never get old. A whiteboard where a hand holding a marker explains an idea, a product, a service, or whatever, using simple animated drawings.

The technique isn’t new — it’s basically the teacher’s hand drawing on the board, just like in school. What’s innovative is doing it on video and animating it in post-production. And the first to do it was UPS in 2007.

Larry Bloomenkranz, vice president of advertising, brand management, and sponsorships at UPS at the time, says they were looking for a very simple idea that would let them explain UPS’s complex logistics and freight solutions in a way that was accessible and easy to understand for everyone.

And they absolutely nailed it. Just a few masterful marker strokes on the whiteboard, and bam! — a delivery van turns into a freight truck. Brilliant.

They created a campaign of nine 30-second TV spots with the help of director Errol Morris. The production couldn’t be simpler.

Just two years earlier, YouTube had been created, making it infinitely easier to share videos online. Suddenly, everyone wanted to jump on the video bandwagon. And with YouTube’s rise, video marketing became available to everyone, not just companies with big TV advertising budgets.

And UPS had just created a video storytelling style perfect for this platform — a simple, engaging, and, above all, very educational style that almost anyone could use because it didn’t require many resources. Thousands of brands adopted it.

That’s why the UPS campaign is considered the pioneer of explainer videos, particularly in the whiteboard animation style. Seventeen years later, it’s still widely used. The only real change is that the camera shot is a bit tighter, and we no longer see the narrator — just the hand drawing.

8. Always. “Run Like a Girl”

Honestly, how many period product commercials can you remember that really blew your mind? Exactly, very few. But then Always came along in 2014 with its Run Like a Girl campaign, and boom — it changed the game.

It wasn’t the typical feminine hygiene product ad. It was about something much deeper: gender stereotypes.

In the video, they ask adults and teenagers what it means to do something “like a girl,” and, surprise, they all interpret it as clumsy or weak. But when they ask little girls, they run and fight with total confidence. The contrast is brutal: at what point did being like a girl become an insult?

And here’s the magic of well-done video marketing. Always didn’t just create a video; they sparked a social and emotional conversation. This isn’t a video about products — it’s about self-esteem, about female empowerment. That connects on a deep level, and when you achieve that, you’ve got a viral bomb in your hands.

The campaign was a resounding success: millions of views, the hashtag #LikeAGirl blowing up across social media, and awards everywhere — from an Emmy to a Cannes Lions Grand Prix. But most importantly, it made a cultural impact. Today, many girls feel proud to do things “like a girl.” Always didn’t just sell — they changed the way we think.

9. Old Spice. “The Man Your Man Could Smell Like”

The Old Spice ad was first a hit on YouTube, then a TV success, and finally a social media bomb that got everyone talking.

Grand Prix at Cannes Lions, Emmy for Best Commercial, and ranked number 4 on Ad Age’s Best Campaigns of the 21st Century.

But why was this campaign so successful?

Well, it was the result of understanding the market reality, a bold strategy that broke with the brand’s past, and exuberant creativity based on humor.

In the early 2000s, Old Spice, despite being the market leader in the U.S., was an outdated brand aimed at an aging audience and was rapidly losing market share to Lynx (Axe). Something had to be done urgently.

To completely reposition Old Spice as a product for a younger audience, the marketing strategy focused on one key fact: 60% of body wash purchases for men were made by women.

Instead of focusing exclusively on young men as their target, Wieden + Kennedy shifted the focus and directed the campaign at young women.

Results:

Few campaigns have achieved success like Old Spice’s. It quickly became the leading men’s body wash brand in the U.S., racking up a list of awards and international recognition.

• 300% increase in web traffic

• 2,700% increase in Twitter followers

• Old Spice sales doubled in just half a year

• 1.2 billion earned media impressions

• And as the cherry on top, a parody on Sesame Street

10. Dove. “Evolution”

The video that exposed the manipulation behind beauty ads.

Launched in 2006, Dove’s Evolution wasn’t just an ad; it was a bold statement that challenged the beauty standards promoted by the media.

Directed by Yael Staav and Tim Piper, Evolution shows the transformation of an “ordinary pretty girl” into a stunning billboard model. This transformation is achieved through meticulous makeup application and a lot of Photoshop, culminating in a final image that’s almost unrecognizable — and, of course, fake, far removed from the original.

The video was uploaded to YouTube and quickly went viral. Within weeks, it racked up millions of views (let’s remember that YouTube was only a year old at that time). Acclaimed by the advertising industry, Evolution won multiple awards, including two Grand Prix at the Cannes Lions Festival, becoming the first web ad to achieve such recognition in the Film category.

Evolution sparked a global conversation about the unrealistic beauty standards promoted by the media and the impact these standards have on women’s self-esteem. The ad’s final line, “No wonder our perception of beauty is distorted,” resonated with millions of viewers, highlighting the widespread problem of digitally altered images in advertising.

Ready to create your own unforgettable video?

To wrap up this journey through the ten best videos in the history of video marketing, one thing is clear: the power of a good story and the impact an authentic message can have on an audience.

These videos have set trends, not just because of their creativity, but because they managed to connect emotionally and spark reflection beyond their commercial goals. Today, video marketing remains one of the most effective tools to communicate ideas, values, and experiences.

Would you like to see any other videos added to this list? Or do you think we left out a video unfairly? Tell me in the comments.

And if you’re thinking about creating a memorable video for your brand, don’t hesitate to get in touch. Together we can make sure your message has the impact it deserves!