Annie’s Costumes has its roots as a mom and pop costume store that started in the late 80’s, and opened up its first website in 1996. Annie’s Costumes turned to Ten Golden Rules to create an interactive campaign for Halloween 2007 that would expand their Internet brand and entice costume shoppers to visit their e-commerce website. Using a combination of online press releases, viral videos, search engine optimization, web-based trivia game and launching a Second Life virtual store, Ten Golden Rules was able to successfully find new venues to reach consumers and get them to interact with the company’s brand.



Ten Golden Rules produced 3 viral videos for Annie’s costumes, showcasing Halloween costumes for kids and adults, and distributed these videos on YouTube.com. To date, these viral videos have generated 23,240 views on YouTube.com.



Ten Golden Rules launched the company’s brand into the 3-D virtual world known as Second Life with a project that encompassed a virtual retail store, an interactive Haunted House attraction and virtual museum for the Halloween Hall of Fame. During the first month of opening, Annie’s Costumes Second Life store had a 3.7% conversion.





The Web PR campaign was designed to pique the interest of consumers and the media in the latest costume trends and Annie’s Costumes product offerings for Halloween 2007. From August to October 2007, 10 online press releases generated 442,557 impressions with 25,802 page reads.

1. Top Ten Halloween Costumes for 2007
2. Original Michael Myers Mask Featured Once More in the Halloween Movie Remake
3. Naughty or Nice? Annie's Costume's new Playboy Halloween Costumes Let Customers Show off their Sexy Side
4. "Halloween is Awesome" Video Released on YouTube
5. What's Hot This Year in Halloween Costumes
6. Annie’s Costumes Launches Virtual Haunted House and Costume Shop in Second Life
7. Halloween Costumes for a Good Cause
8. New YouTube Video Features Top Ten Halloween Costumes for Boys and Girls
9. Time is Running Out to Buy Your Halloween Costume Online
10. Get Halloween Costume Ideas for Adults the Fun Way

Additionally, the viral videos were used in search engine optimization efforts to penetrate blended search results on Google Universal Search, Yahoo Search and MSN/Live Search. Since their launch, these viral videos have held Top 30 search engine rankings in all three search engines.

(Click on the image for a full view of the screenshots)

Ten Golden Rules produced a trivia game for viral marketing purposes, and to attract links to AnniesCostumes.com. Using their blog, email newsletters and bulletin boards, the trivia game generated interest in their e-commerce site in a new interactive way.

(Click below to go to the actual game.)