A while ago i posted about Vodafone in Spain doing some crazy stuff for their 3G solutions for small businesses. Time after that, they've created a follow-up of that campaign, consisting on a Vodafone employee (that spends some time blogging) and his family going through Spain in a "bus-house" and without a landline number to get connected to the Internet, just a mobile phone and a USB modem. Also residents of each city will be allowed to get into the bus, as it will be staying for two days in each place.

All of this is being blogged at La Casa Movil and although it's in spanish, it's worth a read, you can use some online translation tools to get it translated into English or the language of your choice.

I don't know how to categorize this post because it's not advertising itself but i think that Tweenbots is one of the smartest projects that i've found this year regarding people interacting on their own and with the others for a common cause. A brief description would be that Tweenbots are little robots, human-dependants, that navigate the city with the help of people they encounter, as they roll in a straight line and at a constant speed. Each one of the robots has a destination displayed on a flag and relies on people's help to reach its destination. It's techie but it's also really tender, check the video to see how they work:

Thanks Rafa!

Looks like we've got a new trend here. Following the success of the New York based prank collective Improv Everywhere, brands now start to do their own branded flash mobs. In January, T-Mobile had a huge hit with it's Liverpool Street Station dance. Last week, both Amsterdam and Antwerp had it's turn. Who's next?

The geniuses from Waskman came up with a very original idea to advertise the new Vodafone "Oficina Movil" ("Mobile Office") service, which main value is to avoid freelancers and small businesses being wire-dependant on mobile phones, office phones and data services through 3G technology. So after a while of thinking who the target was they realized they could be the perfect target, so they proposed Vodafone moving their offices to the middle of Madrid and Bilbao for three weeks, writing about the whole process in a few sites.

Barack Obama's campaign was so huge and had so many actions that even two months after the election day passed i'm still finding out about curious things that were done. This is from the day i forgot going to vote and the whole country outraged at me, LOL.

I stole this link from Diego Montesano, thanks man!

I love tactical marketing actions as they are so much able to reinforce the coolness of a brand. Ikea latest action is a great example of smart tactical marketing. In the US they launched a guerrilla action and a website riding the way of Obama's arrival at the White House.

The idea is simple: when you move into a new home, you'd like to furnish it according to your style and personal living needs. Well, if you go on EmbraceChange09, you can pretend to be Obama for a few moments, and organize the Oval Office the way you want.

I don't know how i didn't heard of this campaign before but thanks to my good friends Jesus and Ferran I've seen the light because I think it's fantastic. ZUJI is an online travel company who wanted to be positioned as a company that helps holidays happen. And they did this to make it possible:

You can read the whole case study about this campaign (done by The Hallway and Happy Soldiers) here.

What I love about working in digital marketing is the fact that digital tools can be become even more powerful, cool and engaging if and when they are integrated with the "offline" world. You can apply them to marketing action as well as to art, as this brilliant project made in Pennsylvania demonstrates.

What happened is that a group of people decided to bring to life on Google Street View Sampsonia Way, located in the North of Pittsburgh. As Robin Hewlett and Ben Kinsley, the minds behind the project, explain on the a Street with a view website, Neighbors, and other participants from around the city, staged scenes ranging from a parade and a marathon, to a garage band practice, a seventeenth century sword fight, a heroic rescue and much more. Street View technicians captured 360-degree photographs of the street with the scenes in action and integrated the images into the Street View mapping platform.

Following a tradition of "sure it's a fake but wft" videos (i remember, right now, Ronaldinho's and Lebron James') presenting sports megastars now it's the turn of (for me) the best basketball player over the court right now: Kobe Bryant.

Guerrilla marketing should be both smart and surprising. I think Lastminute.com scored a good point with an unexpected musical performance at London Stansted Airport. A good idea to catch the attention of bored passengers in the waiting room and a good idea to generate some buzz around Youtube users.

via Brainstorm #9

Once upon a time in the West... Toke Nygaard from K10K got his laptop broken, and so it was that the entrance to the portal became a page with a picture of that broken laptop and asking people to collaborate so that he could buy a new one... and he got it!

And then there's the story of the guy who, exchanging things, turned a red clip into a house. Last year, John Grden from Rock On Flash and core member of the Papervision 3D team asked something similar so that he could work on improving the performance of the famous 3D engine on a Mac, and it only took a couple of weeks to get the money through Paypal.

In the end, these situations follow the same pattern, some kind of "together we can", that now has been blended with these viral times of us.

Enfants Terribles is running a guerrilla marketing campaign placing straws around Italian cities. The action, carried out to promote soft drink Chinò has started last week in Turin with straws placed in fountains and other public spots, and will continue over the next few weeks, making Italians and tourists even more thirsty (it's hot, hot, hot these days).

According to the agency, people have already started stealing, collecting and selling on eBay the straws...

From Germany, a tough challenge for those who love talking for hours and hours on their mobile. Organized by T-Mobile, the contest see teams of 2 people aged 18 to 25 constantly talk to each other, day and night. The team that shuts the talking for more than 10 seconds, is striked out. Every two hours, each participant gets a 10 minute break (eat/drink,toilet etc). The other talker has to continue talking to himself and if the team member doesn't return on time, they are also striked out. The team that resists until the end wins 10k...

I feel like I've heard about similar ideas before (I remember a "longest kiss challenge", for example), but in this case I like the fact that the contest is very much linked to the product they're promoting: a flat rate for mobile phones... talk as much as you want, the price remains the same...

Expedia's Blue Sky Day

Broad shoulders for broad concepts

The Shopping Boys

Don’t walk alone

Sex machine hits the road

Urban video spam?

Guerrilla action finds new advertising spaces

Precognition marketing

Sidewalks of Paris

Your ad makes me sick

Guerrilla Lee in Paris

Do you feel sunny?

Ketchup against landmines: too strong?

Everyday Fabulous with ikea

Men's toilet guerilla marketing

Guerrilla World Water Day II

Guerrilla World Water Day

eBay's competitor advertises on eBay (guerrilla style)

More public toilets in NYC!

The Glamour Stiletto Run

Sandadvertising...

Fat missing

The bowling city

Guerrilla marketing for Unicef

Keep your mouth shut

Guerilla against AIDS

Guerrilla Marketers of the Year

Guerrilla marketing in a coffin

Are looking for more cool interactive ideas? Check the archives