My Top 5, Week of 2/21-2/26

Hello fellow adnuts,

This week's Top 5 centers mostly around upcoming and recently launched campaigns, as well as exemplary use of social media by others. I've pretty much exhausted the Olympics and Oscar talk, so we'll just keep it chill for today. Enjoy!

1. As discussed in my post below this, this week's number one has got to be Lady Gaga. Besides being an overnight sensation the likes of which hasn't been seen since Madonna, Gaga's use of social media through Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, and her Web site (see links in previous post) makes her relevant and relatable to her fans. This increases her fans' love for her while showing them how dedicated that she is to her "little monsters." To be totally cliche- yes, we are all gaga over Gaga. However, for a cool interpretation of her Bad Romance video, check out this article.

2. The launch of Axe's new product, Twist, which used a "co-creation" unit of both ad professionals and college students in order to develop the ads for the product. Twist is a new kind of deoderant whose scent changes as the day goes on - kind of, as the article states, how women expect men to be constantly changing in the game of love. You can find out more information on the ads for Twist as well as the first ad in the campaign here.

3. This super nifty article on old cereal ads from The Big Money, chronicling the evolution of the cereal industry from the past to the present. From sexist corn flakes to taboo frosting to a meat substitute, cereal has, and will, always remain a "g-r-r-eat" part of our culture.

4. Fed-Ex is now "shipping" its current marketing strategy to the World Wide Web. Just as other companies have done, the shipping giant, famous for its $379 million budget in 2009, which included ads for the Super Bowl and other pricey vehicles, is now targeting small businesses (less than 100 employees each) in order to rival its number one competitor, UPS. With a series of videos entitled "1-2-3 Succeed!" and starring comedian Fred Willard, Fed-Ex will attempt to increase what it calls a "key market" for them, due to the higher rates that small businesses usually pay for lack of the large volume discounts on shipped items that big businesses get. This Reuters article gives more information on the upcoming campaign.

5. Better watch out, Google. In a recent deal, search engine Yahoo! will now integrate Twitter feeds into nearly all of its products and pages, including Yahoo Mail, Sports, Finance, and Search. Yahoo's strategy to integrate all of the most popular social media sites into its environment rather than trying to compete with them will not only increase the search engine's popularity among younger demographics, but it will also provide an easy way for consumers to get all their information in one place. With the deal already in place with Facebook, this provides an interesting (and probably more successful) adversary to recently introduced Google Buzz, which tries to be its very own social networking tool, but which has not yet gained the essentiality that is common among already established sites like Twitter and Facebook. For more info on the deal, see this AdAge article. Hey, if you can't beat 'em, integrate 'em.

That's all for today. Have a great weekend!