The volcanic eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland some weeks ago brought air travel to and from Europe to a grinding halt, leaving hundreds of thousands of people stranded in cities across the globe. It sparked quite the media frenzy here in New York, and af
ter two days, I had had enough of hearing the same stories over and over again. But I might have stayed tuned in longer had I come across more stories like the one I saw in Advertising Age that took the unique angle of examining the creative ways in which advertising executives got around during this time — trains, cars, ferries, bikes, and overnight disco party boats complete with drag shows. The creativity inspired me to share with you some of my favorite thinking-outside-the-box marketing campaigns:
1. The Pepsi Refresh Project — After 23 consecutive years of running TV commercials during the Super Bowl, Pepsi passed up this top advertising opportunity in 2010 to focus instead on engaging and forming relationships with consumers and their communities through a social responsibility campaign.
2. ZackJohnson 16 — By introducing young women to the adolescent male character of Zack Johnson, who wakes up one morning to find himself with “girl parts,” tampon maker Tampax was able to get them to open up and share valuable insights on this sensitive topic through their discussions with Zack and amongst themselves on www.zack16.com and Twitter @ZackJohnson16.
3. The Fun Theory — In order to promote its new environmentally-friendly VW cars, Volkswagen tested the theory that fun can change people’s behavior — for the better — via a number of public experiments, including Piano Staircase and The World’s Deepest Bin.
4. Interactive Radio Spot — Hotel Arena in Amsterdam wanted to increase bookings at its restaurant, so it created a radio spot that made the reservation process easier. All listeners had to do when the ad played was hold their landline phone receiver up to the radio speaker and then wait for the broadcasted dual-tone multi-frequency signals to automatically dial the number and connect them to the restaurant.
- Melinda Reger
