Adland points us to a fetish-focused site for electronics distributor Cosmos on which the usual arty images of perfect males and female bodies are adorned with links to products available from Cosmos. What this has to do with selling technology we don't know but, oh wait. Silly us. Sorry. We lost the mantra for a moment there. OK, now it's back. Sex sells. Sex sells. Sex sells. Repeat after us. Sex sells. Sex sells. Sex sells. OK, we feel better now. Sorry for that brief lapse in knowledge on our part. We'll try not to let it happen again. There is some nudity on the site.
In what BBDO Canada calls inventive, the agency has created a campaign for Pepsi's Pepsi Access Canada, a site that provides people with "access to ultra exclusive music, downloads, concerts, merchandise and events." To promote the site, BBDO Canada seeded will seed (although BBDO, as of June 8, says the client has not yet given approval) peer to peer sites like Acquisition and Kazaa with MP3s that appear to be unreleased tracks from major artists but when the user downloads the song, this (removed from YouTube at the request of BBDO Canada) is what they hear. Basically, BBDO and Pepsi are tricking people into believing they are downloading new music when, in fact, they are downloading an ad promoting Pepsi and its association with really cutting edge groups like...oh...INXS which almost may have been cutting edge about 20 years ago.
Anyway, less "inventive" are several (1, 2, 3, 4) ads BBDO created to promote the site which humorously follow the actions of a couple guys as they try to obtain access to popular Canadian groups such as Kardinal Offishal, Swollen Members, and Dashboard Confessional.
UPDATE: The MP3 file that was to have been seeded has been removed from YouTube at the request of BBDO Canada who claims (or had to based on the choices YouTube provides when a cancellation request is made) they were used without permission even though they were sent to us by someone from BBDO Canada to be featured here on Adrants. Twisted. Consequently, because of this and other companies who have sent in content and then had other entities with the company or partner companies make complaints, our YouTube account has been closed. With bandwidth constraints in mind, we'll host what we can here or we will rely on the marketer/agency to host things themselves. The frustrating thing here is everyone wants there work seen by everyone - and we want to show it - until those nasty usage fees and other issues come into play.
UPDATE II: We've been told the file that will be seeded has not yet been approved by Pepsi and that is why BBDO Canada asked YouTube to remove the file and has asked us to clarify that here.
Appearing to be some sort of lung capacity test for cancer prevention, an officious sounding woman instructs visitors to Lungster how to conduct an online lung capacity test using a microphone or headset. The test calls for the visitor to blow as hard as they can into their microphone or headset to determine lung capacity. But, midway through the test, visitors are interrupted and told, well, just take the test yourself to find out. It's worth it.
The site was created by McCann Norway.
Here's a whacked, little microsite for James Ready beer that involves monkeys, an image of your face and lots of monkey noises. It's all promoting cases of James Ready 5.5 which are available for $24. Cundari created the work.
Coolzor points to a MobuzzTV report that explains all those weird websites on which two guys with green hats promise multiple countries they'll support their football team rather than their own. Of course, something this silly always turns out to be a viral marketing campaign and, in fact this is just that. Heineken built all these sites and then unveiled the whole thing last month in a video in which everyone wore a green hat to a game. Mirroring the strict Olympic-style brand police attendees slipped by security with the hat only to, en mass, remove the hats from their heads and transofrm the thing into a branded Heineken megaphone. Now this is some cool marketing.
Pokerroom.com has released a couple of videos intended to go viral to promote its services. One illustrates the importance of having a good hand. The other, the sex one (you knew there was going to be at least one of those) speaks to the importance of position. Both are good. The one that talks about having a good hand is the better one though, Yes, we did just say the non-sex one is better than the sex one.
In a clever bit of marketing, SanDisk has launched a site called iDon't to promote its new Sansea e200 MP3 player. The approach is a snipe at the ubiquitous iPod and features links to other anti-iPod sites as well as schwag, posters, templates and chat icons, all of which carry the iDon't anti-iPod message. Of course, to be complete, there's a weblog on which Da Sheep Herder will continue to spread the iDon't propaganda. No that anything's going to knock the iPod out of its top spot but this is, by far, the best marketing effort to have taken on the iPod. The site must be making the rounds because it just became unavailable. Perhaps it's on the receiving end of come Boing Boing, Digg, Fark, Slashdot action.
When it comes to promoting Coke Light in Brussels, they don't sign some random pop star to perform canned dance moves, they go out and film real people doing real dance moves and let others create their own dance moves on a website that collects all these dance moves. On the sitem you can watch dance clips or upload your photo onto a random body and create your own dance clip. Predictably. most are amateurishly bad but, then again, people love to see themselves on camera and send them to their friends so I guess this could work.
There's a little rumor going around that a disease called Morgellons, a creepy skin disease that involves little bugs a bug-like sensation under the skin, and the websites associated with it are just a viral marketing campaign for the upcoming movie A Scanner Darkly. Michael Shostack of The Halting Point has collected some information pointing to the likelihood the disease is, in fact his opinion, a viral campaign. Shostack, who, since one never knows when it comes to virals, may actually be part of the viral campaign, points to a Slashdot story which says "Imagine having a disease that is so controversial that doctors refuse to treat you." The Slashdot story leads to a June 2005 Popular Mechanics story about the disease which has, reportedly, been around since 2002 when websites (1, 2) about the disease began appearing.
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It seems Boston's Digitas has been busy creating a Geocities-like site for Gillette called NoScruf. NoScruf stands for National Organization of Social Crusaders Repulsed by Unshaven Faces, a group ,headed by apparent swimsuit model Terry Tarentelli, that is sick and tired of the unshaven, male scruffy look. In a sort of protest, women on the site appear unshaven with hair on their legs and under their arm pits. There's a couple films that document the movement. The site is purposefully designed to look like crap and just like Geocities sites of yesteryear, there's broken links, cheesy graphics and really bad typeface. It all kinda makes you want to go out and by a really good razor...from Gillette, of course.
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