How about a dose of stand-up comedy while you pump your gas, or grab your morning cup of Joe? That’s what SeeSaw Networks is betting consumers want via its new branded entertainment agreement with Manhattan’s Gotham Comedy Club to reach that elusive, sweet spot demo of 21 to 49 year-olds.

A series of short-form videos, The Gotham Moment, will feature 10-12 comedians with ten minutes of “clean, evergreen material appropriate for retail settings,” distributed across SeeSaw’s place-based media network.Continue reading...

As part of its global "Visual Life" campaign, Intel has launched what it's calling a first of its kind YouTube interactive: The Escape, an "immersive, impactful interactive experience that draws users into a new world of visual possibilities with Intel."

The YouTube experience (tagline: "Escape to a new world of visual possibilities") integrates with the user's Facebook profile (although non-Facebookers can participate), the viewer is drawn in as a participant in a cinematic thriller, taking part in the adventure by solving puzzles and following along with the action (the camera is from the user's point-of-view).Continue reading...

When Procter & Gamble quietly pulled the plug on a Facebook e-commerce effort last year that used Amazon as the sole retailer for fulfillment of orders, according to AdAge, the CPG giant did so in part because it was concerned about miffing its counterparts at Wal-Mart corporate.

The bricks-and-mortar retailing king increasingly is asserting itself online, and executives at P&G presumably didn’t want to vex their family-friendly programming partners at Wal-Mart, with whom P&G produces made-for-TV movies such as this weekend's anti-bullying drama, Field of Vision, premiering June 11th on NBC.Continue reading...

Can a global marketing campaign turn a packaging material that most people take for granted into something that stands out — indeed, don't even "see" but see through?

Owens-Illinois intends to find out.

O-I, the world's largest glass container manufacturer, has been making iconic glass containers since 1903, counting among its clients Anheuser-Busch InBev, Coca-Cola, Heinz, and PepsiCo.

The company has just launched a global marketing push with a new logo and tagline "Glass Is Life," all highlighted on a new website as the anchor of an integrated campaign.

The media plan includes print ads (in 12 countries and seven languages) and supported by Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, where inspirational interviews play up the importance of glass.Continue reading...

Perrier is in the midst of an interactive marketing campaign — one that comes, naturally, with a twist. In what's being billed as a first, the French beverage brand has opened Le Club Perrier on YouTube. As the screenshot above indicates, as more people watch, more of the online experience is revealed.Continue reading...

Intel may be touting its latest product launch — ultrabooks — but it's also looking to inspire and engage consumers, which is why it keeps anthropologist Genevieve Bell on staff. To that end, it's expanding the Visual Life campaign which was introduced in January at CES with a new short film and an interactive social web experience.

The latter, a digital brand experience called The Museum of Me, has already garnered more than 20,000 Facebook likes — which is fitting, as the project aims to turn your Facebook profile into a work of art.Continue reading...

Perpetually in search of brand innovation since 1883, when it introduced its first major brand, Ivory Soap, Procter & Gamble’s corporate commitment to innovating is articulated in the June issue of Harvard Business Review, where P&G is dubbed the "new growth factory."

The HBR article, "How P&G Tripled Its Innovation Success Rate" (co-authored by P&G CTO Bruce Brown and Innosight managing director Scott Anthony) looks at how digital platforms have filled the branded content hole created by the collapse of TV soap operas, a branding medium that P&G helped invent with Colgate-Palmolive and Lever Brothers.Continue reading...

Yes, you read that headline correctly. In its first foray into branded entertainment, Butterfinger (you know: the candy brand) has asked Rob Lowe to direct a 25-minute short film, titled Butterfinger the 13th, that will debut on Oct. 13th, just in time for Halloween. Watch its Facebook page for details on how the actor (and now director) plans to incorporate the public into his shoot this summer.Continue reading...