Ad-Free Blog Sells Out to Twix

After receiving an email from Sinuate Media, a company that represents a project for Twix, Andrew Krucoff, publisher of the ad-free blog Young Manhattanite, decided to sell out. He was contacted by Sinuate Media's Justin Chiang who asked Krucoff to post banners promoting a sweepstakes in return for a bunch of free candy bars and some MLB tickets. Apparently a lover of candy, Krucoff caved at agreed to post the banner. So much for the ad-free blog concept.

Sea-Doos, Experiential Markets, Nokia Blogs, Cement Speeds

- AdFreak says two out of the three Sea-Doo films are pretty good. We'll take thier word for it since, like many bloated sites, it wouldn't load well for us. Then again, that could just be our crappy Internet connection. And if you're wondering what Eric Roberts is doing these days. Here's your answer.

- Jack Morton has published a white paper which finds experiential marketing to be more likely to "increase understanding, lead to action and inspire advocacy."

- Nokia is running a blog-based campaign in Toronto and Vancouver to promote its new 6682 phone. The company has promised to send bloggers the phone for free if they qualify (age, blog size, location, etc.)

- An Iowa construction company which is building the Iowa Speeday is promoting the track by outfitting ten of the company's cement trucks with Iowa Speedway decals.

- Crispin Porter + Bogusky's VW Configurator, which was developed in part by IQ Interactive, took home a Cyber Lions Grand Prix.

- It's in French so we're not sure what it's all about but we do know it's for Coke BlaK. We've also seen the hippy-dippy floral/bubble theme before. Yup, we have and it was for Coke's M5 project.

Superman Tags Call Attention to Christopher Reeve Foundation

Hoping to achieve the ubiquitous popularity the Lance Armstrong Foundation Livestrong bracelet did, the Christopher Reeve Foundation has launched a campaign to promote its Superman Tag, a dog tag-like item with the Superman S that can be worn on a necklace, on a key chain or on clothing. The campaign, which will include print, online, PSAs, cinema ads, blogger outreach and a MySpace page, intends to leverage the upcoming Superman Returns movie to build additional awareness of the tags which will carry the tagline, "Go Forward." Proceeds from the sale of the tags will go to the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation.

Warner Brothers has allowed the campaign to use the S symbol royalty free for the duration of the campiagn which will run until February 2008.Euro RSCG 4D created the campaign and is urging sites to donate ad space for the campaign. HealthOrbit and Prevention have. Adrants will be donating space as well. If you are so inclined, ad banners are available on the SupermanTag site.

Snickers Hires Blogger to Reach Sk8ter Dudes

Jake Levine, who's from Cherryfield Maine, a place we've actually been to believe it or not and where a great uncle of ours once owned a big company there called Stewart's Blueberries, was selected by Snickers to become the an ambassador for the candy company and Burton. It's an effort by Snickers to smartly reach an audience immune to traditional media. Called The Rover, Jake will traverse the country for a year leading every sk8ter boi's dream; an all expenses paid position as board sports ambassador, hanging with riders and boarders, attending events and drooling over Gretchen Bleiler. Oh, and he'll be blogging the whole thing too. Unsupervised and Unedited we're told. They're will also be podcasts. And, in a bonus, mud wresting appears to be part of the deal too. There's more campaign info here.

The King Hooks Up With New Ad Babe

Shannon Stephaniuk of Toronto-based Glossy got to be queen for a day when she met up with the man in the strange mask who was in town shooting his latest commercial with the famed Perlorian Brothers. She had some time to hang with the King and get a few pictures. Since the King was dumped by Brooke Burke, maybe he's moving in on Shannon now. She is pretty cute after all.

New Mobile Service Provider Maximizes Influencers

New mobile service provider Helio, with help from StreetVirus and Alt Terrain, has launched an influencer marketing campaign consisting of in-venue pop up stores, a print magazine, a blog and sponsorship of local artists. The in-venue stores include a mini-lounge and employees are given Helio phones. Each store receives free ad space in the Helio magazine and become an exclusive retailer of the devices.

The artists sponsorship provides artists with hard-to-come by public mural space to showcase their work, financial support for their gallery shows, exposure in the Helio blog and the print magazine that is nationally distributed, and artists are provided a Helio phone of their choice. For a new company without a lot of money and one whose services appeal to the social networking needs of tweens, teens and twenty-somethings, Helio has headed in the right direction with this influencer marketing approach. You can see some of the artist's work here.

In Sponsoring Music Festival, AT&T Finally Delivers Blogging

As part of promoting the Austin City Limits Music Festival, Project D.U., an AT&T blogger-powered portal and branded RSS reader, is hosting a blogging contest that awards the winner a free press pass and pass for a guest to the three day event. Held in an area where WiFi is not available, AT&T will provide service, finally lending, perhaps, some truth to those Blogging Delivered outdoor boards that ran a while ago. Any music blogger that isn't already part of the Project D.U. network of bloggers can submit writing samples to be considered here.

Cows Say Stop Squeezing Us, Drink Soy

First there was the Raging Cow and now there's Cows for Silk. To promote Silk, a soy milk product, the company has decided to use cows in its ad campaign and to create a site/blog where cows named Frank, Connie and Amanda can babble on endlessly about why it's better to drink soy than to have their own tits (yes, that is the term farmers openly use to describe that particular piece of cow anatomy) squeezed for milk. We pity the poor marketing people/copywriters who have to write cow hottie stuff like this:

"Drinking Silk was my first step to the "wow Amanda is so fine" comments. I eat healthy because I can. I get herbal swamp mud and fragrant sea cucumber body wraps at the spa because I can. And I drink Silk because I can. I know that this is the only Amanda I get - you better believe I flaunt it."

Stormhoek Winery Blogging Campaign Wins Award

Gapingvoid's Hugh Macleod worked with South African winery Stormhoek to create a blog-based campaign for the small vintner which involved the creation of a blog and a tasting campaign with wine being sent to other bloggers. The campaign was awarded "The Best Consumer Campaign" by the 2006 "The Drinks Business Awards" at the London Wine and Spirits Fair. The winery bested the big guys including Chivas Regal, Campari and Mateus Rose. It was all done with a $400 piece of blogging software. And, we assume, Macloed got a little green stuff too but it pales in comparison to the millions the competitors spent.

Budget Rent-A-Car Relaunches Up Your Budget Treasure Hunt

On June 5, Budget Rent-A-Car will re-launch its Up Your Budget Treasure Hunt game. Last time, physical clues were placed in 16 cities around the country with online videos hinting at their location. Upon finding the clues, winners would receive $10,000. This time, the game is "armchair" so everyone can play without leaving the comfort of their home. The contest will last for four weeks. Each day, Monday though Thursday of each of the four weeks, clues to a virtual journey will be provided. Contestants, using the clues, will guess the length of the journey weeks' journey and offer up their answer Friday. The person guessing the exact mileage or the closest to it wins $25,000. Second place gets $10,000, third gets $5,000.

The game, as it was before, is blog-based and users will be encouraged share their stories as they hunt for the contest's clues. The contest will be promoted with a nationwide, live-read radio buy and an online buy on the BlogAds blog advertising network. The campaign was concepted (oops, conceptualized) by Cendent Car Rental Group's (Budget's parent company) Becky Alseth and IMPAX Marketing's Jay Arnold and designed by Design4Results' Komra Moriko. The blog ads can be viewed here.