Canvas Shoes Are A Canvas for Creative Expression

I like when brands act as canvases for their customers to make meaning. To me, that’s how connections that lead to repeat transactions are made. Today, Vans is launching their latest brand campaign – Waffleheads – a series of videos about collectors, customizers and creatives that have truly turned Vans into a canvas for creative expression. These […]

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Minute Maid Questions What Good Is, Decides, “this is GOOD”

Parents today see picture-perfect families everywhere, especially in social media. Minute Maid’s new brand campaign is encouraging parents to embrace their perfectly imperfect family moments and show how even though it’s not always Instagram-ready, “this is GOOD.” Minute Maid partnered with Edison Research to commission the “This is Good Parenting Survey” to better understand how […]

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Brevity Is The Soul of Wit, But Not On Twitter, Not Anymore

Twitter doubled down on its character limit this week. Users of the social media platform are now able to update in 280 characters—twice the previously allotted character count. The news isn’t going over particularly well in certain circles. At least two literary lions loathe the change. Twitter’s destroyed its USP. The whole point, for me, […]

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Nine Founders Rock BMW’s Hot Seat

Startup founders think big and act fast. BMW and their ad agency, KBS, understand the mindset, and chose to appeal directly to entrepreneurs with BMW Hot Lap Pitch, a high-speed spin on the classic elevator pitch. An elevator ride can be frightening for some, but these brave entrepreneurs pitched their business ideas to VCs from […]

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Are You Ready To Sing for Your Ribs?

How many great songs have been composed about food? In Louisiana and Texas, every other song is about food. I’m not complaining—I eat it up. While food is a universal theme, it’s not easy for a brand to come up with the kind of tune that hooks listeners. Chili’s managed to do it two decades […]

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To Drive Chevy, Larkin Sandgroper Migrates To Detroit

I am fortunate to meet interesting people care of my work here at AdPulp. Can I tell you a story about one such reader turned friend and colleague? Charlie Quirk is a Larkin Sandgroper, a.k.a. a man from Western Australia. He plays Aussie Rules Football, drinks beer and tells off-color jokes. He’s also making his […]

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VML Dreams Up Juicy Promo For Wendy’s Bacon Portabella Melt

Wendy’s believes you’ve earned it. Earned what? Their new Bacon Portabella Melt. With the help of VML and voiceover artist Jon Bailey, the QSR came up with a neat way to engage customers around this new product offering. I haven’t heard the phrase “consumer generated content” in some time, or “co-creation” for that matter, but […]

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Consumers Salute Dr. Pepper’s 70s Flashbacks With Parodies of the Parody

Travel to Dr. Pepper TEN with me and taste the Bold Country.

As a child of the 1970s and a fan of John Denver, you can see why Deutsch’s 70s flashbacks appeal to me. Nostalgia is a trip.

To evoke an authentic 70s feel, Deutsch made an effort to get the images to appear historic. The commercials were shot on 16-millimeter film, then copied onto a VHS video tape, which was then baked to age the images further.

The Grizzly Adams meets Hamm’s commercial-inspired work is now spawning some original reproductions, a.k.a. honorary spoofs, which is high praise for any ad campaign (much higher praise than even the most prestigious industry award, if you ask me).

Of course, in the spoof above, Miller Lite gets a starring role, not Dr. Pepper TEN.

See what happens when you don’t have attentive PAs on the set?

Previously on AdPulp: Dr Pepper Ten Is The Manliest Way To Drink Diet Soda

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Artificial Scarcity Leads One McRib Fan To Help Others

People are passionate about McDonald’s McRib sandwich.

The fact that the sandwich is not available at all McDonald’s locations nationwide simply feeds this hunger for the chain’s pork sandwich, which comes with pickles, onions and barbecue sauce and is shaped in an unusual patty, made to look as though there are bones inside.

According to Entrepreneur., one big fan of the sandwich, Alan Klein, turned his passion for McRib into an interesting side-project.

McRib Locator, a website and Android app that tracks where the sandwich is available has already charted around 1,500 sightings, with 300 confirmations this year (confirmed by users emailing Klein a photo of their receipt).

This is the kind of naturally occurring consumer advocacy and consumer generated media that CMOs dream about at night.

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McDonald’s Canada Is Soliciting Very Short Pitches for Very Short Films

The art of the pitch in Hollywood is something few writers ever master, but the writers who do are able to earn serious cash for their ideas. In other words, you can write a brilliant screenplay but if you can’t pitch it in 30 seconds or less, you’re going nowhere fast, like Friday afternoon traffic on La Cienega Boulevard.

So, why not get in a little practice? @McD_Canada wants to hear your 140 character pitch and make very short films from the best ideas.

According to Digiday, it’s “like an exercise in absurdist micro-stories.”

Here’s an idea with a fighting chance:

The storylines must involve a McDonald’s product.

If you want to pitch an idea, visit this promotional microsite from Tribal Worldwide in Toronto and make McHistory.

#MakeMyFilm

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Postagram And Hyatt Hotels Team Up For A Consumer-Generated DM Campaign

The buzzword “consumer generated media” has gone away, as buzzwords will. But the facts remain. When brands help people do cool things, it can be a powerful approach to earning good will.

According to Adweek, something as simple as a brand-provided post card (and the postage to send it) can make a difference.

Postagram Postcards on Facebook

Through Aug. 15, Hyatt Hotels is encouraging guests to personalize up to two complimentary postcards via a Facebook app that’s available on Postagram and Hyatt House’s pages on Facebook.

The offer is aimed at guests, but anyone can use it to send two free postcards.

Chris Walker, VP of brands for Hyatt House and Hyatt Place said, the campaign helps guests “keep up with friends, colleagues and loved ones while they’re on the road, which can often be tough to do.

“Most direct mail is boring stuff,” said Matt Brezina, CEO of Sincerely, which owns Postagram. “What we are doing is different because it’s personalized. What’s more, it’s personalized by someone the recipient actually knows. It’s not just from some company.”

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Promotions Rock When They’re Also Participatory Multi-Media Events

Once upon a time sales promotions were made from cardboard. They were flat, two-dimensional and lacked engagement. In short, promotions were boring. Thankfully, the promotions industry has outgrown its awkward years.

Thanks to an influx of technology and the social interaction that it facilitates, sales promotions are now smart, connected, participatory events with multi-media campaign support. For example, Frito-Lay recently crowd-sourced new product development via a consumer-generated content promotion called “Do Us A Flavor.”

Note how the old meets the new in this promotion. A “submit your favorite recipe” contest with a one million dollars prize is old as the hills. The pun headline too. What’s new is the amplification through social media, the social voting mechanism and the “15 seconds of fame” granted to, or forced upon, the winner.

One of the primary obstacles in promotional marketing is people tend to believe they will not win. I think a focus on the winner helps break down objections a bit. Knowing that the winner of Lay’s recent contest is a librarian from Land O’ Lakes, Wisconsin, helps others see themselves in her $1 million richer-shoes.

If only they had thought of “Cheesy Garlic Bread flavored potato chips” first!

Previously on AdPulp: Promotions Continue To Mutate Into Consumer Generated Social Motions | Location-Based Promo Makes Perfect Sense For Big City Daily

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Instagram Gets All Facebookey, Introduces Who’s Who Photo Tagging

You know how you can tag your friends in a photo you upload to Facebook? Now Facebook-owned Instagram is introducing the tagging feature.

Mike Isaac of All Things D believes the move could be a boon for brands.

Photos of You essentially gives a brand the ability to crowdsource photos of its products — likely put to use — from the millions of people who are on Instagram and taking pictures all the time. So, basically, if I’m Nike, I could potentially get tons of free content for my Photos of You tab, all courtesy of the rest of Instagram.

Could be good. Could be a mess.

It may be worth noting here that Facebook and Instagram are working to deliver better user experiences, but what do we immediately begin to consider when a new feature like this is unveiled? How brands are going to game the system.

How very Pavlovian — platforms bark and media and marketing people jump.

In other digital identity and social media news, the NCAA has banned the display of #hashtags and social media URLs on football fields. What century are those fools livin’ in?

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Download Vine, Make A Movie and Share It

Vine is Twitter’s new video App, where users capture short bits of video to share with their friends. Naturally, brand marketers are jumping all over this as widespread adoption among smart phone users is rapidly on the rise.

According to Techcrunch, Vine is presently the #1 free App in the iTunes store.

Here is a look at how my alma mater is applying itself on the platform:

What are you bringing to Vine?

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Hard Numbers To Hit

Gavin Heaton, has metered out the components of digital storytelling the way a conscientious chef would when writing a cook book.

Like anything, you need to start with an idea. This is the 1%. A good idea will get you started but an idea on its own is dormant. There is another 9% that is planning. You need to think through the what, why and how of your story. You need to consider the methods you will take to bring your idea to life.

The next 40% you need to focus on execution. This is the actual doing of the work. This brings together the idea and the strategy and makes it available to the world. The remaining 50% is participation …

It is this final 50% that is the MOST important element. Without the participation of an audience your project is a failure. In the digital story, all MEANING is co-created. That means that, after launch, your digital story continues. It needs feeding. You need to respond to the nuances of its reading. You need to ENGAGE.

I like what Heaton is saying here, even while recognizing that my own digital stories fall well short of the kind of deep and lasting engagement he’s calling for. I also question whether this POV isn’t a bit dogmatic. And what is this “digital storytelling,” he speaks of? I’m pretty sure it’s not a story published online. Not in any traditional sense.

Character Sketches Needed

MySpace is collaborating with best-selling Brazilian author Paulo Coelho to make a user-generated movie of his book The Witch of Portobello.

Users can submit videos focusing on one of the book’s characters to MySpaceTV or Coelho’s MySpace page, and up to 15 winning submissions will be molded into a video “mash-up” called “The Experimental Witch.” Users can also submit songs for a soundtrack to the film, with up to 16 selected for the project.

Submissions for the project, which will be promoted in 20 countries, will begin on June 16 and close on July 25, with winners to be announced on August 24. Coelho said that winning filmmakers would receive a reward of 3,000 euros ($4,638).

Coelho communicates with his readers via his MySpace page and he said he finds the service “addicting.”

HP is also a sponsor.

[via Adweek]

Not Digging “Dig The Digs”

Bill Green wants to hit something.

This is why:

So another brand–Century 21 this time–is jumping on the consumer generated content promotion bandwagon. Is that really reason enough to hit something? Before you answer, consider that the contest is void in several states, one’s home has to be listed with Century 21 (duh!) and one’s listing agent must appear in the video. Are you ready to hit something now?

The reality is there are few leaders in business or any enterprise. Leading brands are already waist deep in social media. For all the rest, they’re just now waking up to the idea of a blog, a YouTube page or heaven forbid, a Twitter account. It’s going to be hard for those of us in the Communications 2.0 game to take these Johnny come lately brands and their various “ideas” seriously. Yet, it’s our job to do so.

Make A Little Vid, Then Make Some More Vids, And So On, Ad Infinitum

Every brand and her uncle are conducting consumer generated video contests.

redBullTitle.gif

Here’s one that makes sense for the brands involved.

Red Bull, Media Lab Studios and Independent Film Channel have joined to create “After Hours Web Series Challenge,” a video contest aimed squarely at the aspiring filmmaker set.

According to the IFC-hosted promotional microsite:

One lucky filmmaker will receive their very own production deal with IFC.

The series should explore your definition of after hours- even if that means 9:00am on a Tuesday.

It should explore how one’s attitude changes, how rules and expectations change when the clock hits a certain hour. What can be done in those hours you can’t do at any other time? What are the possibilities, the limitations? How do you and your world change after hours?

The best pilot or trailer, as decided by Red Bull and IFC, will be made into a series – with you as director!

I wonder if the contestants will have seen Martin Scorsese’s 1985 film, After Hours. I hope so. I also wonder if Scorsese knows about this contest. I hope so, given the name.

Steve Nash Shows Nike And The Interwebs Who He Is

According to The Wall Street Journal, NBA star Steve Nash went native and produced his own Nike spot.

Mr. Nash, who plays for the Phoenix Suns, says he is happy with how Nike has marketed him but felt he could come up with an ad that reflected more of his personality. There was little financial risk to Nike, since the campaign would require no ad buy. He says he got the idea from the young fans who take pictures of him with cameras and phones during his informal workouts. “There’s such an appetite for the ordinary stuff I do every day,” he says.

Mr. Nash received little input on the shoot from Nike, which pays him about $1 million a year to promote its sneakers, although the company provided one of the two cameras and edited the piece.

A Nike spokesman said the company has no problems with Mr. Nash’s ad and welcomes other athletes to follow in his footsteps.

Nash didn’t act alone (and it’s a stretch to call his spot user generated content). He enlisted Lola Schnabel, the daughter of artist and filmmaker Julian Schnabel, to shoot the self-styled Web ad for the shoemaker. So, it’s star generated content, but it’s still indie and that’s cool.