Coca-Cola today unveiled its London 2012 Olympics marketing plan, with an integrated campaign called "Move to the Beat" that's inspired by the sounds, spirit and culture" of the host city, and also extends and reinforces its global campaign to engage teens through music.

The centerpiece of the 2012 campaign: Grammy award-winning producer Mark Ronson is creating an anthem with flame-haired British singer Katy B that "fuses the sounds of Olympic sports with the beat of London music."Continue reading...

Fiat USA executives have been disappointed that the brand and the new 500 haven't been catching on so far in the United States as well as they had planned. So hopes were high for its latest US TV commercial — featuring Jennifer Lopez driving a Fiat 500 in what is really a Fiat-funded teaser spot for Papi, her latest music video — until the spot was panned by critics for taking product placement to new cheesetastic levels.

But in the criterion that really counts — is JLo helping to sell Fiats in America? — People's 2011 Most Beautiful Woman is turning heads toward the brand.

Consumer consideration of the car on the pages of Edmunds.com has climbed by 31% since the ad broke on September 12 during ESPN's Monday Night Football, the automotive-information website reports. Fiat consideration was up 95% alone on September 18, when the ad ran throughout Sunday NFL telecasts.Continue reading...

In honor of its season sponsorship of The X Factor on FOX, which the New York Times reports "fell short" in the ratings department for its Wednesday night debut, Pepsi's new commercial during the series premiere.

Pepsi's spot pays homage to the artists and performers in its advertising campaigns: Britney Spears, Michael Jackson, Kanye West, Mariah Carey, and Ray Charles. The theme: "Pepsi's music heritage continues. Who's next?"

With its latest collaboration, Target is going from Missoni to Tony. It's not exactly resurrecting the Rat Pack, but the retailer's new deal with Tony Bennett underscores one thing: Retro is cool.

The mass retailer has always been known for pace-setting deals with, for example, name product designers that have kept Target on the watch lists of style-conscious young women — and typically out of the same sentence with "Walmart." Target's hit (and sold out) collaboration with Missoni is the latest example of that.

While its exclusive promotion with the 85-year-old crooner isn't quite on the Missoni scale, this one also involves a collaboration with a venerable brand of Italian descent. In announcing that it will offer an exclusive version of Tony Bennett's new studio album, Duets II, beginning today, Target is laying down yet another marker of its cultural relevance.Continue reading...

Chrysler unveiled a Fiat commercial featuring Jennifer Lopez and the new Fiat 500 during the first night of the 2012 NFL season. JLo has released the full video for her single, Papi (above), and as promised, it's one long product placement — and not just for Fiat.Continue reading...

It comes as no surprise that Disney's Lion King 3D dominated at the box office over the weekend: it's only available for two weeks, parents are dying for entertainment for their kids, and it's the Lion King in frickin' 3D. Box office gold.

There are no product placements in The Lion King 3D. But then, The Lion King 3D is the product. At its core, Lion King 3D is just another brand extension, a practice at which Disney is nearly unmatched.Continue reading...

This weekend will see two two films with seemingly nothing in common targeting two diametrically opposed audiences.

Drive is about a stuntman who moonlights as a getaway driver.

I Don't Know How She Does It concerns a finance executive who moonlights as a mother.

Both appeal to an audience looking to find a little bit of themselves in the respective film's principled, if flawed, heros.

Helping define these strong personalities? Products, of course.Continue reading...

As the twin gods of fate and irony would have it, an online search for "the Tea Party" promotes the Canadian rock band of the same name, with teaparty.com leading to the band's homepage, where visitors are met with the greeting: “No politics…just Rock and Roll.”

The Led Zeppelinesque Canadian band officially broke up in 2005 but they regrouped this year for a reunion tour. Still, their domain name is being eyed by the US Tea Party movement and others with a political agenda. With 2012 US campaigning heating up the band's domain name is a hot property, still high in Google rank and the first web address that comes to mind for the political Tea Party.

The digital situation is confusing to all concerned, including the musicians. “So much damage has been done to our name by the political movement that we’re considering selling” the domain, comments the band's bassist, Stuart Chatwood, to Bloomberg Businessweek.Continue reading...