Big-name brands fuel Rhett & Link's funny videos

Jefferson Graham, USA TODAY | USATODAY

Show Caption Hide Caption Talking Tech | Rhett and Link Meet YouTube stars Rhett and Link.

Rhett %26 Link work with advertisers to finance their YouTube videos

Brands are hungry to reach the millennial audience

Their videos have pulled in more than 200 million views overall

SOUTH PASADENA, Calif. — Gals, who would you rather kiss? Rhett McLaughlin, dressed today as a caveman, with a huge bushy beard and hairy wig that seems to stand nine feet tall, or his clean-shaven best friend, Link Neal?

McLaughlin and Neal are performing a video skit in this Los Angeles suburb in front of an $800 Canon EOS Rebel camera, part of a four-minute video for their popular Rhett & Link YouTube channel. The video was financed by Procter & Gamble's Gillette razor division, as part of its online KissAndTellUs.com campaign.

Like many YouTube performers, the two spend their days coming up with funny videos: Theirs have pulled in more than 200 million views overall.

The twist is that unlike many of their counterparts, they actively work with companies to have the videos mention or even lampoon a product.

"We always tell our audience that the brands enable us to make videos that we wouldn't be able to make without the money they provide," says Neal.

For the Gillette spot, for instance, they were able to rent a horse for $400, get some "roadkill' for $250 and various other props.

What started with cold-calling companies turned into successful partnerships with some of the biggest names in advertising, including McDonald's, Coca-Cola, Alka-Seltzer, Starburst, Taco Bell and Trident gum.

"Consumers are subjected to so many traditional messages," says Geir Skaaden, a senior vice president for audio firm DTS Audio, which has signed for an upcoming sponsored video. "If you want to strike a chord with them, it's important to come at them with multiple angles."

Skaaden liked that with McLaughlin and Neal, he'd not only have their services for a funny video but also get access to their large online audience. "They bring you distribution with a big fan base," he says. "For us, that's a no brainer."

Brands are hungry to reach the millennial audience, and they use Rhett & Link videos as a vehicle, says Alex Angeledes, chief revenue officer at Collective Digital Studio, a Los Angeles-based company that manages the careers of McLaughlin and Neal and other YouTube video creators.

Brands get a big benefit when a video goes viral, says Angeledes.

Build.com, an online home improvement retailer, worked with the duo for a 2012 online video. "You can borrow genius talent and get more eyeballs at a fraction of the cost of working with an ad agency," says Brandon Proctor, Build's vice-president of marketing.

Build paid the pair $25,000 up front to produce the spot, he says, with another $25,000 in reserve if the video got 500,000 views on YouTube. It ended up drawing 2.2 million views on YouTube and other websites, including CBSNews.com, Mashable, BuzzFeed and ClipNation. (The duo also participate in ad revenues generated by YouTube and Collective.)

"If we had it on our own, the costs would have been significantly higher than what we paid them, and we don't get the same amount of traffic," says Proctor. "This is a great way to get your name out there."

McLaughlin and Neal insist that their videos are not commercials, but sponsorships.

Companies approach them with a message, and "we'll incorporate that into something that will also work as a Rhett & Link video," says McLaughlin, 35. "It has to be something that doesn't turn our audience off."

For Taco Bell, the duo went to a drive-up window and sang their order of tacos, burrito and extra rice — for four minutes. A spot for McDonald's, which ran on TV, featured the duo in hip stop-motion talking about the dollar menu at the fast food chain.

For Trident gum, they were really ambitious, using the theme All Night Long (and the Lionel Richie song) to sing a karaoke version, literally, all night long. With a time stamp at the bottom of the screen to show the action through sun-up, the pair tote a microphone, speaker and backing track all over Los Angeles. They sing the song while riding the subway, walking down Hollywood Boulevard, eating doughnuts and playing video games.

McLaughlin and Neal grew up in rural Buies Creek, N.C., best friends since the first grade who both went on to get engineering degrees. Along the way, they wrote funny songs and performed skits for local groups, while working post-college as engineers.

They made funny videos, including an early parody of MTV's Pimp My Ride, in which they make over a baby stroller. Their Pimp My Stroller video was copied and posted on YouTube without their approval, but they got more views that day than they had in the previous year.

That wake-up call encouraged them to create more. They had their first brush with show business when the CW Network hired the duo in 2007 to host Online Nation, a collection of funny Web videos. The show was canceled within four weeks.

Another TV network, IFC, hired them in 2011 for another funny video show, but it only lasted 10 weeks.

Still, they moved to Los Angeles to pursue their dreams, and now spend every day making videos for YouTube.

With IFC, "the audience was so limited," says Neal, 34. "Only people who had that channel could see it. But today, anyone with an Internet connection anywhere in the world can see our work."

They won't discuss money, but TubeMogul, an online Web-buying company, says top YouTube creators make more than $100,000 a year.

"We're making enough money to support two families living in Los Angeles," says Neal. "Producing videos for YouTube. Amazing."