Get Ready with James Ready 5.5 - Monkey Generator

james_ready_steve.jpg

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.

by Steve Hall    Jun- 5-06    
Topic: Consumer Created, Good, Online, Strange, Viral



Guys With Green Hats Promise Football Support, Heineken Viral Ensues

heineken_hat.jpg

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.

by Steve Hall    Jun- 2-06    
Topic: Good, Viral



Non-Sex Poker Viral Better Than Sex Viral

poker_sex.jpg

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.

by Steve Hall    Jun- 2-06    
Topic: Good, Online, Viral



SanDisk Says 'I Don't' Want An iPod

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.

by Steve Hall    May-23-06    
Topic: Good, Online, RSS, Viral, Weblogs



Booties Shake In Belgium For Coke Light

coke_light_dance.jpg

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.

by Steve Hall    May-23-06    
Topic: Good, Online, Viral



Fake Disease Created For Viral Movie Campaign?

morgellons.jpg

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.

more »

by Steve Hall    May-22-06    
Topic: Viral



Gillette Launches NoScruf Viral Campaign

terry_noscruf.jpg

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.

by Steve Hall    May-18-06    
Topic: Brands, Good, Viral



MSN, Sprite Launch Social Site 'Exposure'

exposure_mskimist.jpg

Our spies tell us StrawberryFrog has created an online campaign for MSN and Sprite called Exposure. It's a site the agency created to highlight work from three different groups of kids: graf artists, a basketball team and a band. Each person is making a video (or it's being made for them) about who they are, what they do, what they stand for, how they think. The video are then edited and placed on the site. We're told new content will be added to the site over the next six weeks. It's sort of a cross between reality TV, documentary-style video and a blog of sorts. Each person has an MSN Spaces blog as well.

more »

by Steve Hall    May-16-06    
Topic: Consumer Created, Good, Online, Trends and Culture, Viral, Weblogs



Gawker Strip All Ads From Site Except One

gawker_detoxed.jpg

Copyranter points us to Gawker today where the New York gossip site has, with the click of a button, allowed its readers to banish all ads from the site except for evian water who is sponsoring a detoxed version of the site for two weeks. Once the button is clicked, all ads disappear except for some subtle mention of evian, some soothing snow-capped graphics and a means for those who publish an RSS feed of their site to "detox" their own RSS feed. The sponsorship was done in partnership with Mediavest and Feedburner. This is what the Adrants RSS feed looks like "detoxed."

more »

by Steve Hall    May-16-06    
Topic: Good, Online, Opinion, Publishing, RSS, Viral



HBO's 'Entourage' to Give Away Cars in MySpace Page Promotion

entourage_myspace.jpg

This MySpace page, set to launch Wednesday, created by Deep Focus and promoting the news season of HBO's Entourage is about the most tweaked out MySpace page we've ever seen. In fact, except for the MySpace URL, you wouldn't know you were on a MySpace page. While other companies have co-opted MySpace for commercial gain, this is, by far, the most elaborate we've seen. The page is still in the test stage with many non-working links but there's a contest that calls for entrants to create a MySpace page featuring the member's own "entourage" and then publicize it through the member's network of friends. Not a bad way to get HBO's Entourage message in front of a ton of MySpace members. The motivation to create a page comes in the form of a chance to win a car four each of the four people in the member's entourage. Other prizes include trips to LA with $1,000, Xbox 360's, Samsung cell phones and Entourage DVDs.

more »

by Steve Hall    May-16-06    
Topic: Cable, Consumer Created, Good, Online, Promotions, Viral