PepsiCo is taking humorous branded entertainment very seriously. Witness the digital campaign to promote its now-rolling-out Pepsi NEXT beverage: "Drink It to Believe It," offering the first-ever "Internet Taste Test" on Facebook.

Combining humor and a virtual sensory experience, the campaign kicks-off with comedian Rob Riggle in a ‘how-to’ video, above, about the test while watching his online persona "trying" Pepsi NEXT. Other video impressions of digerati "taking their first sip" of the new cola with 60% less sugar include social marketing maven Gary Vaynerchuk and Internet meme, Scumbag Steve.

The Internet Taste Test Facebook app invites fans to opt in for the chance to watch themselves "taste" new Pepsi NEXT as a dozen Funny or Die improv comics perform their impressions using information from social profiles, like "likes" and “experiences.”Continue reading...

Social media has pretty much reinvented everything, including the way brand advertisers approach digital marketing. So it's no surprise that marketers are employing a promotional technique commonly used in the past, but updated for the digital world.

Live product demos (and live television shows, for that matter) dominated the three television networks in TV's heyday, the 1950s and 1960s, as Stuart Elliott points out in today's New York Times. It wasn't unusual to see personalities like John Cameron Swayze demonstrate a Timex watch being mercilessly tortured in a live television commercial that ended with the famous line, "It takes a licking and keeps on ticking."

Fast forward to 2011 and watch Hewlett-Packard reinvent the idea. Marking its first foray into branded entertainment, the tech brand will stage a live product demo on YouTube, Facebook and mobile this Friday — instead of TV. And while it won't be torturing one of its Web-connected printers, HP hopes the blend of live + crowdsourced + comedy will engage viewers with its new technology.Continue reading...