Famous mouths opening up — isn't that what the Grammys are all about?

Miracle Whip has just posted a teaser video on its YouTube channel (watch above) hinting at some of the gold-plated throats that will help the brand promote its sponsorship of Sunday's Grammy Awards telecast on CBS, recording a song (a title guess: "We are the Swirl"?) and using the tagline — "Keep an Open Mouth" — that the Kraft-owned brand introduced during another awards show: the 2012 Academy Awards.

Participating musicians include Scottish singer Susan Boyle, country legend Wynonna Judd (who's been tweeting about the launch—see below), former 'N Sync vocalist Lance Bass, '80's pop star Tiffany, former Guns N' Roses guitarist Gilby Clarke (who tweeted an Instagram photo of Boyle with his motorcycle; thanks, Fairacre, for the Twitter tip), and members of the Village People (who posted photos from the video shoot on Facebook), all seen in a behind-the-scenes video during the taping at Ocean Way Studios in Hollywood.

The teaser ends: "Famous Mouths Are Opening Up for Miracle Whip" and promises an "epic video" (update: watch it here) that will be "opening" on Sunday. Ahead of Sunday's debut, the campaign is being promoted on the brand's Facebook page and on Twitter with the hashtag #KAOM, an acronym for the "Keep an Open Mouth" tagline.Continue reading...

LUNA Bar is rebranding itself as a “thought leader” on women’s nutrition, and expanding its reach to include dieters.

Its six "Debunking the Diet" webisodes, hosted by "Funny or Die" writer/actor Erin Gibson and nutritionist Tara DelloIacono Thies, premiered this week with a focus on weight gain and late-night eating.

The spots support the brand's new tagline, "Feed Your Strength," and are appearing on Luna's Facebook and YouTube pages as well as health-related websites, The Huffington Post and Daily Candy.  Other campaign messages include “Moderation, not deprivation” and “Strong beats skinny.”Continue reading...

The Old Spice Man is no longer on a horse, but he's got a few other creatures at his back.

The latest W+K effort by director Tom Kuntz for the P&G-owned brand promises unbridled (yet elegant) animal magnetism with The Wild Collection, a trio of manly new scents: Wolfthorn, Hawkridge and Foxcrest. The tagline, naturally, is "Answer the smell of the wild."

Watch the first two spots, featuring tuxedo-clad gents and their wolf and hawk companions, along with their social messaging, below. Update: According to Ad Age, the Wolfthorn spot will run during the Super Bowl — but only in Alaska, home to America's biggest wolf population.Continue reading...

The Onion's stature as a leading satirical pseudo-news source, with its hilarious and sometimes provocative headlines, has long been well-established. Less known to the general public, however, is the existence of its own in-house and marketing agency created to serve leading brands.

That changed to a degree on Monday when The New York Times reported on Onion Labs' latest project: a website for Hilton Hotels and Resorts that helps users detect whether they have "vacationitis" and provides various suggestions on how to combat it.

"Some of our most popular satirical editorial content in The Onion surrounds the workplace and everyday stresses, so it's been exciting to work with Hilton Hotels & Resorts to illustrate diagnoses of vacation blues around the world," stated Grant Jones, The Onion's head of marketing who oversees The Onion Labs. "The cartoon memes aim to inspire workers to fill their 'prescriptions' with a much-needed break from the office."Continue reading...

Leveraging its design chops in a whole new way, Target is launching a new multi-faceted marketing campaign behind its CPG products with a decidedly unique twist.

"The Everyday Collection" by Target isn't its latest limited edition designer collaboration. It's a minimalist campaign touting — wait for it — groceries, from cake mixes to laundry detergent, prenatal vitamins to cuts of steak. It's also applying its acknowledged sensibilities in fashion and design to promoting the, let's face it, more mundane SKUs in its inventory on behalf of its brand affiliates: consumer packaged goods.Continue reading...

Pizza Hut Canada thrilled its Facebook fans by whipping up a batch of limited-edition perfume and sending it to the first 100 to raise their wrists — with a new batch on its way — while sending one lucky follower an original cartoon on the inside lid of a pizza box (check 'em both out, below).

Now the brand's Canadian marketers are rolling out (no joke) a hotdog-stuffed pizza crust, previously tested in the UK, from Dec. 4 to Jan. 7. Only in Canada, eh? Pity.Continue reading...

It's amazing it's taken The Onion this long to create a video spoof of social marketing, with a mock social media TED Talk, above, featuring a social media charlatan talking about how he scammed Cheetos, Shell and Speed Stick. Below, watch some other classics of the social/digital guru takedown genre, including Adobe (which has a couple of horses — Adobe Analytics and Omniture — in the social ROI race), whose "BS Detector" video is featured on the Onion's homepage today; the BBC's London 2012 "Perfect Curve" mock digital agency; and the 2009 (NSFW) classic, "The Social Media Guru."Continue reading...

Colorado-based condom brand Sir Richard’s is a cheeky marketer, as we noted last year. How's it looking to make some noise this year for its all-natural brand? Supporting today's first annual Birth Control Day, "a holiday commemorating the responsible decision of choosing not to be a parent."

Their prophylactics have no spermicide, parabens or glycerin, and while the company "has nothing against parents, or even children for that matter,” it encourages “you and your significant other to celebrate the ability to fornicate to your heart’s content without procreating."

The campaign features 12 digital “Happy Birth Control Day” cards with Somecards-style messages to be disseminated on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest or via email. Samples include: “Let’s not make the same mistake our parents did,” “I’d rather not remember we slept together in 9 months,” “You had me at ‘condoms’,” and “Let’s change positions, not diapers.”Continue reading...