Criss Angel's MindFreak would not seem to need additional promotion. A and E renewed his contract and the ratings could not be better.

Criss Angel's relentless marketing and tireless promotion are likely the secret to his success in a very competitive marketplace. He competes with magicians as well as hundreds of entertainment options from which the public may choose. Ad Week notes, "[w]hile Criss Angel, the magician star of A&E's Mind Freak show, might not be truly clairvoyant, he has a viral video campaign that makes it seem like he is. The push, created by Omnicom digital agency EVB, uses hundreds of dynamically combined video shots to create the illusion of mind reading."

You can check out the video for yourself at www.freakyourmind.com.

Once at the site, you will be asked to submit a friend's name and phone number. Criss Angel then "generates a Web address to forward, which hosts a video with the mind trick employing the recipient's name and number. Angel then follows up shortly afterwards with a pre-recorded, personalized call to say it was all a joke—along with a reminder to tune in to Mind Freak's premiere episode June 5."

The ad agency sees the Freak Your Mind campaign as the perfect fare for 18 to 34-year-old men. Coincidentally, this is exactly the same demographic Criss Angel hopes to capture with his MindFreak show.

What are the odds of that?

We do not want to spoil the trick for you so stop reading (and skip to the bottom links) to keep it all a mystery.

So how does Criss Angel perfectly name the friend and identify the telephone number?

The tech guys "spent a day filming Angel using 500 different names and a series of numbers. Once a user enters a name and number, a video file is automatically assembled to match the details." They wanted to make sure the voice quality sounded natural and seamless -- not like the computerized call routing system at your bank or the directory assistance operator.

"To enhance the illusion, the user is not sent to a freakyourmind.com URL, but instead EVB uses a time4vids.com site that appears like a run-of-the-mill video sharing site."

Check it out for yourself (and your friends) at www.freakyourmind.com.

Very cool.

- Provided by InsideMagic