“Fun Friday” is my attempt to bring joy, smiles and hopefully laughter to your end of the week by sharing with you some of the best, the coolest, the funniest, the craziest, examples of advertising I’ve come across during the week. I’ve been toying with this idea for awhile but have finally decided to give it a shot. Let me know what you think and also feel free to share your own interesting examples of advertising or marketing you’ve seen lately. Happy Fun Friday!
To kick things off I thought I’d share with you an awesome experiential ARG (Alternate Reality Gaming) campaign from Nike that recently launched in London called “Nike Grid.” The campaign was all about running and the “grid” was actually 40 postal codes within the city of London. The objective was for each registered participant to run from phone box to phone box across London in order to claim the most streets in just 24 hours. For each phone box you “checked in” at you got points, and the more you ran the more points you were able to accumulate. Another cool thing about the campaign was Nike used inspiration from FourSquare by issuing “badges” for speed, endurance and stamina and tracked participants scores throughout the entire campaign on its’ Nike Grid Facebook page. How cool is that?!
When I came across the YouTube video for this campaign I was instantly ready to go to nikegrid.com to register and I’m not even a runner! I’m hoping the campaign was successful enough that Nike will consider doing a similar campaign here in the US. Either way, I definitely think more brands should look at creating unique and engaging ARG campaigns like this one because it allows people to engage with the brand in a very non-traditional way and makes the brand more memorable.
Next up for your viewing pleasure is a hilarious YouTube video from GPS maker TomTom, featuring a “behind the scenes” look at Lord Darth Vader’s voiceover session for the new Stars Wars TomTom lineup. The video spoof was created to help promote the debut of the new Star Wars lineup that launched May 4th with the release of Lord Darth Vader and continues throughout the summer with C-3PO arriving in June, Yoda in July and Han Solo in August, according to the press release. This is absolutely one of the funniest branded videos I’ve ever seen and the more than 1.3 million views already on YouTube are evidence that a lot of other people think so as well. You can get Darth Vader and your favorite Star Wars GPS voices by visiting tomtom.com/starwars. May the force be with you!
Last but not least is a fantastic new augmented reality microsite that just launched from Hotels.com called “Virtual Vacay.” Created by Young & Rubicam Chicago, the site allows users to virtually visit 10 US cities by using a webcam image and reality technology. Guided through a city of their choice by “Smart,” Hotels.com’s animated spokesperson, users are able to create a virtual character using their webcam or camera phone and are even able to choose the type of trip they want to take, such as a nature adventure or a shopping tour. Another cool feature is the virtual postcard people can create and share via email or social networking sites.
This is by far one of the best augmented reality sites I’ve seen yet for a variety of reasons. First off, it’s more than just a fun little interactive game for people to play. It’s a helpful tool and a fun way for people to engage the Hotels.com brand that gets them excited about traveling. Secondly, the site allows people to book a trip immediately through the Hotels.com website to any of the cities featured in the site. This means the site acts as sales driver for Hotels.com and also allows them to track conversation rates and traffic numbers. Lastly, I really like how the site provides users with the option of playing around with the site from their home computer or from their smartphone, thus making it easy for people to interact and engage the Hotels.com brand from wherever, whenever. Pretty cool stuff!
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