Campaigns with a participative prize

I noticed an ad for this in the Metro this morning

www.californiacalling.co.uk

We’ve all come across campaigns that ask people to do things in return for a ‘money can’t buy prize’.  Now ordinarily I would applaud this participative approach to marketing but I’ve begun to realise that there’s some of these campaigns that I like and some that make me feel a bit uncomfortable.  And I’ve worked out what it is.

The good ones are those for which the prize is rooted in the real world – Queensland tourism ‘Best Job in the World’, Walkers ‘Do us a flavour’ etc

The suspect ones are those for which the prize is to appear in an ad.  It’s incredible how many of these there are (Wispa, Oxo, Doritos etc).  I would argue that twenty years ago giving someone the opportunity to appear in an ad was quite exciting.  Doritos just about got away with it because the spot in question was during the Superbowl.  But nowadays, with a bit of effort and creativity I can make myself famous without the need to appear in a TV ad for a brand that I probably don’t care too much about.  Why be in an ad in the middle of X-Factor when I can actually be in X-Factor?

So next time you present a campaign idea that asks people to do something in return for a prize try to refrain from the prize being ‘to appear in an ad’.

Agency Videos – Christmas or otherwise

A little flurry of agency videos has just hit the interweb and the reaction has been mixed to say the least.  Producing an agency video has always been fraught with potential disaster.  What’s bloody hilarious to all your employees may well induce nausea and vomiting in the wider world and I’m struggling to think of a good one.  Which is why making one when the only U-Matic copy was held safely in a locked room was probably OK but now it’s up on Youtube the whole world are ready to throw their rocks at a moment’s notice.  It is now safe to assume that Dare will produce a proper turd in the next year……

Three exhibits

1) The original and probably still the best – Mindshare Amsterdam working hard for their client’s money.

http://www.brandnewtelly.com/mindshare/

2) Lean Mean re-penning ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas’ as ‘Do they know it’s web 2.0′.  I’m not sure I want to know but it’s all for charidee.

3) Publicis – ‘I gotta feeling’ – So have I and I think I might need a Rennies