The Idea Bounty Blog in Campaign Of The Week

Lifelong friends and comedic duo of Rhett and Link are at it again. This time the hilarious pair of friends compete for the affections of a waitress at a Pizza Parlour. The mysterious waitress provides a packet of Dentyne gum, thereafter Rhett and Link decided to get their rap on… here’s how it went down!

This is the height of interactive entertainment - at the end of the video Rhett and Link prompt the viewer to go back to the main site to vote for the overall winner of the rap battle. This is a really awesome campaign as Dentyne; one of the world’s largest provider of sugar free gum has sought the online comedic talents (Rhett and Link) to punt the infamous product out for them.

Rhett (Rhett McLaughlin) and Link (Link Nea) are lifelong friends andare no strangers to online video - originally from North Carolina they attended the same schools, college and even double dated their current spouses. They originally gained fame through various battles involving T-Shirts, Robotic girlfriends, Fast Food, Crayon Colours and even Guacamole (Avocado). Brilliant move by Dentine to commission something like this, expect to see more ‘entertainment advertising’ like this in the future! 

Trust a beer brand to come up with a campaign that feels like a mixture between some male fantasy science fiction world and at the same time acts as a 'get out of jail free' card when it comes to explaining to your girlfriend why you are not at home with her…. because you are at a bar.  Introducing The Teletransporter - an innovative way for beer lovers to get some extra time in at the bar. Check out the case study video - its absolutely hilarious.

I will admit the campaign errs on the controversial side but you have to give it credit for its inventiveness and interactivity never mind its humour. Personally I would be wary of using the Teletransporter - duping the girlfriend with the risk of her finding out could end up landing you in the fire rather than the frying pan - but I have to admit that under certain situations it could be quite useful. Kudos to Cerveza Andes beer for putting together such entertaining campaign. What do you think of the Teleransporter? Would you use it?

We’re rather obsessed with Old Spice at the moment. They’ve recently introduced two new videos in addition to the first and ridiculously popular I’m on a horse viral and a more recent version here.  What excites us even more is how the campaign is panning out. For two days the Old Spice dude repled to tweets and You Tube comments personally – it’s social media marketing gold.

Here's our top 5:

1. @Gizmodo asks: will anything surpass the loofah as the predominant body wash-applying technology? The answer? A live wolverine!  

2. @jsbeals asks the Old Spice man to ask his girlfriend to marry him. He completes the proposal with dimmed lights, candles and a ring. She said yes (of course).

3. Old Spice responds to slightly under the weather Internet entrepreneur, Kevin Rose and even greets him in binary.

4. Ashton Kutcher tweets at Old Spice and Kevin Rose and in return gets some advice from the shirtless man and the scientific low down on his voice.

5. The Old Spice man is asked by Alyssa Milano whether he's flirting with her after the initial video response to a tweet. He responds with this video, flowers and a handwritten note from his heart to her door step.

There are many things we love about this campaign - the personalisation is obviously key but the freedom that Old Spice as the client gave their marketing team to pull this off is almost unprecidented. Getting togehter a team of creatives, tech geeks, marketers and writers to produce 87 short comedic YouTube videos about Old Spice in 11 hours in not an easy thing to do! The campaign came to an end on Wednesday when, In his final tweet and video, The Old Spice Guy (AKA Isaiah Mustafa) says, “like all great things this too must end.”

As you can imagine there is quite bit of talk about this campaing. It has set the standard for social media campaigns and you can bet your life savings it will become a campaign marketing experts will admire and follow in the years to come. This is the future of marketing. If you dont agree with me then check out all the 'mash-ups' and remixes that have already started popping up. What more could you want a campaign to do for your brand?

If you are interested there is a very cool explination of how the whole campagin was done on ReadWriteWeb by Marshall Kirkpatrick

Just over five days ago the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival 2010 concluded, as per usual, in fine style after handing out some very deserved awards. One of the categories that I am most interested in is the Film category (possibly because its hard to produce truly fresh work in this medium these days) and the 2010 festival did not disappoint with its selection for the top award - a Cannes Film Lions Grand Prix. The deserving ad - Old Spice's "The man your man could smell like" TV spot.

Look at your man. Now look back at this ad. Now back to your man. Now back to the ad… how good is the ad!? According to its creators - agency WIEDEN+KENNEDY - the ad was created to appeal to men as well as women, showing them both how great a man can smell when they use Old Spice Body Wash. The ad does just that - appeal to both men and women. With more than 11 millions views and a compliment from jury president Mark Tutssel at Cannes: "Old Spice was the perfect film – it took an old sleeping brand and woke it up. Overnight it became a cultural phenomenon and captured the imagination of the planet." I would say it has done its job.

The interesting thing is that the TV spot is the culmination of a massive make over of the Old Spice brand that started almost 5 years ago. Apparently Old Spice send more than ⅔ of their entire ad budget for 2009 on a series of ads just like the one that picked up the Cannes award. The goal was to move the brand away from being associated with sailor, fishermen and your dad to something younger and fresher - more spice if you will. So has it worked? Well take a look at the transition their print adverting has taken over the last few decades above and consider that TIME magazine is blogging about how exited they are about the sequel they must be doing something right. Yes there is a sequel....

Now if you don't agree that is some of the best copy writing for a TV ad you have come across lately I want to see what you have been watching. Shot in a similar style to the first ad - the whole as is a single tracking shot - and again staring former NFL player Isaiah Mustafa as "The Man Your Man Could Smell Like" is set for viral success and I don't have to tell you why.  Now if you will excuse me I have to go and practice my swan dive……