Gorillas And Women Tag-Teaming On Spa's Hair-Removal Campaign

A guerrilla campaign is nothing new to the world of marketing. This time, a brand uses gorilla suits in their guerrilla campaign!

According to BrandFreak, Bliss spa has donned a wilder persona for its new hair-removal campaign. In addition to sending out the typical bikini-clad women onto the streets of New York City, people in Gorilla suits (also wearing bikinis) will also be tagging along handing out free samples and coupons to Bliss.

The gorilla suits not only make a humorously exaggerated jab at people who neglect hair-removal but will stand out in a crowded marketplace.

Jones Soda Contest Hits The Road For Travel Photo Ops

Summer is the perfect time for a roadtrip. It's also a ripe opportunity to take photos of this vast country that we normally don't have the chance to experience. What if we could share the experience with everyone else?

Jones Soda is giving the public an opportunity to have their travel photos published on Jones soda bottles. According to a Promo Magazine article, by uploading photos and recording trip itinieries onto social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, and Flickr, Jones Soda will follow all the participants of their roadtrip contest. Various prizes such as bumper stickers and coupons will be given out throughout the contest.

This is a great way to encourage consumers to participate in a brand promotion, and not to mention, bring out the road warrior in all of us.

Svedka Vodka's 3-D Avatar Bot Wants To Turn Party Animals Into Party Machines

With so many social networks beckoning, or rather enthralling us to submit as much personal information as we can to the internet, it is not a surprise to find the same is happening in mass marketing.

According to BrandFreak, Svedka Vodka is one of the newest brands to try to appeal to our recently heightened sense of vanity. It plays off the print/television advertising which uses the Svedka robot. Using an online application, Svedka allows users to upload pictures of themselves and become a Svedka party machine.

While the site loads rather slow, the program is an interesting way to leverage their current campaign. It also has a social media component, allowing consumers to invite friends.

Domino's Ads Pop Up On City Sidewalks

Cities like New York, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia are known to have graffiti scrawled across all sorts of places. Either as a form of artistic expression or street tagging, graffiti has always been an underground sort of thing.

In a BrandWeek article, it appears that Domino's Pizza has become one of the first major American company to utilize graffiti in a campaign in the United States. Domino's has imprinted the Domino's logo onto major city streets by using an eco-friendly graffiti company by cleaning the street grime around a stencil of their logo.

This campaign allows Domino's to get exposure on neighborhood level. Domino's is also giving away $15 coupons to the first 250 people to find and take a photo of the graffiti.

Evian Replenishes Brand With Break Dancing Babies

Viral videos have taken root in culture and the media in these past few years with the rise of the streaming video giant YouTube. But the idea of upscale brands utilizing the same technology as small and upstart brands to launch national campaigns is an intriguing strategy.

According to BrandWeek, Evian has done just that by juxtaposing its high-end brand with a veritably low brow video that has been circulating the internet over the last couple of weeks. The main theme behind Evian's campaign is rejuvenation. With babies rollerblading and break dancing to a popular rap tune, the video certainly projects an image of freshness and youth. Not to mention, a boost of life to Evian's struggling sales. It seems that no matter what end of the spectrum a product emerges from, viral videos have official become a platform in the advertising world.

Private Label Programs Take Off

It's time to let go of all your preconceptions of private store brands. There has always been an unspoken rivalry between national brands and private store brands. Maybe the quality was suspect. Consumers feared being pegged as cheapskates by purchasing store brands.

But according to a BrandWeek article, it seems like private label is soaring.

7-Eleven is one of the corporations that is embracing the launch of private label products. Started out as a frugal shopping alternative, many consumers have stuck with the private labels even as recession begins to show signs of improvement. They find the quality to national brands comparable or in some cases, better. This trend will allow many retailers to introduce even more products into the market.

Chipotle Serves Free 'Food, Inc.' Screenings

Many restaurants and supermarkets are probably not very keen on the release of the new documentary, "Food, Inc." The documentary uncovers many of the ill-advised and shameful practices conducted by the food industry in order to produce cheap and high volumes of product.

Chipotle, on the other hand, is sponsoring free screenings of the film in 32 cities, according to Brandweek

Chipotle is relishing "Food, Inc." since it allows the opportunity to showcase its eco-friendly “Food with integrity” philosophy. Chipotle will also be included on a segment in the film's DVD on sustainable agriculture.

Facebook Action Will Pick Winner of HBO's "Pimp Ray" Contest

The whole point of an advertising campaign is to appeal to consumers. But what if consumers are behind the campaign? It would skip over the advertising agency that would normally have a team of people developing creative.

According to an article in Promo Magazine, HBO is giving the public an opportunity to create an ad on a website for the main character of its newest show "Hung."

But instead of HBO executives choosing the winner, Facebook users will be the ones to make the decision simply based on which ad was clicked on the most.

Microsoft's Office 2010 Software to Redefine Action and Adventure

Since the launch of the Mac vs. PC advertisement campaign by Apple, Mac un-officially established itself as the "cool" operating system. And as a result, PC (or rather Microsoft) has been chalked up as the boring one and a symbol of the cubicle-confined grey suit drones.
But Microsoft has blasted away this stereotype with its new action-packed Microsoft Office 2010 campaign. According to BrandFreak, the campaign is basically a viral video that has been circulating on YouTube. By parodying big-budget summer action thrillers and making quips about itself, like Clippy the annoying paperclip that showed up in various Microsoft Office programs, Microsoft not only found a great way to entertain the consumers but also garner interest in its new product.

Doritos Puts Virtual Concerts In Chip Bags

With new technology continually on the rise and seemingly unstoppable, it's about time that food products becomes a part of this innovation.

Enjoying food is already about as interactive a consumer can get with a product, that is until Doritos introduced their Late Night brand which will put re-introduce the idea of "virtual concerts."

According to an article in Promo Magazine, the specially designed Doritos bag has a symbol which when pointed at with a webcam on the Doritos Late Night website, a virtual performance will pop out of the bag directly. Artists signed up include Blink 182 and Big Boi and each virtual performance can be made individual depending on how the bag is held or shaken. There is also a sweepstakes to win tickets to Blink 182 shows. This sounds like a breakthrough promotion to us.

Big Conde Buy from P&G

The magazine industry has taken a big hit in the current recession. Conde Nast, publisher of Vogue, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker and many more, has been hit the hardest due to its inflexibility on ad rates and dependence on luxury advertisers. But a new deal with Proctor & Gamble will mean big changes.

According to BrandWeek, the deal will involve multiple titles and related websites in September (the most important month for the fashion industry). The campaign will involve brands such as CoverGirl, Olay, Pantene, Secret and Gilette, all of which are mass-marketed products rarely found in Conde Nast publications. P&G has also decreased its spending budgets in other areas to increase its budget in national magazines.

Hershey Game Offers Sleepover At The Smithsonian

Every child has dreams of spending a night in a museum. The new film, Night at the Museum: Battle at the Smithsonian, banks on this childhood wish. And a new Hershey's contest can make the wish a reality.

According to Promo Magazine, Hershey's will offer five winners, through specially-marked Hershey's products, a sleepover at a Smithsonian gallery featured in the film, VIP after-hours tour, and $500 in spending cash. Hershey's is also offering a wide array on contests to win cash prize on their online website. And to get the word out on all these fabulous prizes, two main characters from the Night at the Museum will be featured in all Hershey's television spots.

Author Wins Cheerios Contest, Book Inserted In 1.5MM In Packages

Cheerios has always been a part of a delicious breakfast. Children have also enjoyed Cheerios over the years and have become major consumers of the brand. So it comes as no surprise that Cheerios is now tucking away children's books with its delicious breakfast bites.

According to an article by Promo Magazine, Cheerios has been inserting winning copies of its children's book writing contest in its packaging. The winner not only get exposure to the target audience but also a great opportunity to publish with Simon & Schuster, a partner of Cheerios in the Spoonfuls of Stories program (where another contest is already on the way).

7-Eleven Offers Veterans Franchise Incentives

One of the most difficult part of in the life of a veteran is finding a career after discharging from the army. 7-Eleven is hoping to make this transition a bit easier by offering veterans discounted franchises. According to an article in BrandWeek, the discount is 10% off the initial franchising fee for the initial 7-Eleven - a savings of $1,000 to $35,000 depending on the store.

A veteran and a West Point graduate himself, 7-Eleven CEO Joe DePinto finds that not only are veterans some of the most deserving group of people in the country, but they also have work-ethic, leadership and team-building skills useful in becoming a business owner.

Marketers Prepare To Conquer With Japan's "Wavertising"

Promoters are always looking for new ways to plant advertising. With freeways, pavements and fields covered in logos and skywriting no longer an innovative medium, only one other earthly element is still relatively brand-free: water.

According to a BrandFreak article, promoters in Japan are hoping to change that with a new technology developed by Akishima Laboratories that literally allows programmers to write in water. The device is called AMOEBA(Advanced Multiple Organized Experimental Basin) that is a cylindrical rim lined with about 50 triggering device that can create any patterned wave possible. It can create both letters and symbols, and in a way, also has a mystic air about it. It will come as no surprise if AMOEBA becomes an integral part of the next wave of advertising.

Google On Hispanic Marketing

Interesting post on the Google CPG Blog about marketing to U.S. Hispanics.

Baseball Promotions

Baseball promotion isn't all about one game. MLB and their partners are on an ongoing quest to find more interesting promotions than bat days and foam fingers.

This promotion from State Farm Insurance and MLB offers a chance to throw out the first ball at the world series. It sounds good, I just hope it doesn't get complicated like this Pepsi Yankees ticket giveaway promotion in Times Square. Minor league teams out west are encouraging fans to dress up like Klingons. Yikes!

Out Of The Box Wine Promotions

Wine is a top category for brand loyalty, and what better way to reach wine drinkers than by putting a glass of wine in their hands?

Restaurant and Wine Shop promotions are common, but the question remains - where else do people drink wine?

Transatlantic flights, of course. I love New York promotions has set up wine tasting in London's Heathrow airport of Fingerlakes, Long Island, and Hudson Valley wines to promote NY state tourism. "This is an excellent opportunity to create an association between the very well respected Virgin brand and New York state, and also make travellers between London and New York aware of some of the superb wines and wine-related opportunities available in the state of New York." Says Lyndsey Sugden, head of marketing for the New York state tourism division.

Is your product a perfect pairing? Our friends at DVF winery are seeking a partner for 2010 Earth Day promotions. This is a great chance for a green brand to meet consumers along side DVF Bota Box wine, packaged in a recyclable carton printed with soy ink.