Choosing the absolute best campaign of 2011 was an extremely difficult task. I had chosen JayZ and Bing's Decoded campaign as uniquely stellar,  but then I saw it actually launched in late 2010.  I also thought Sneakerpedia.com from Foot Locker was a wonderful way to tap into their customers passion and let them showcase their prized possessions, but that really was a rehash of Art of the Trench from Burberry last year. And Burberry is certainly one of the smartest digital marketers around, finding just the right balance of open access and exclusivity. So when they launched their 2012 line on Twitter in September, allowing social media users a first glance at their upcoming clothes before even Anna Wintour and Kanye West had a peek--that too was brilliant, but somehow not quite daring enough. It had to be something really unique to be number 1. And so.....

Number 1

Intel's Museum of Me (PER)

After much consideration, I have chosen Intel's Museum of Me as Numero Uno.  It's not just because over a million people tried it.  The Take This Lollippop app--also a contender for #1 --was actually the fastest downloaded app on Facebook ever. But The Museum of Me not only tapped into the true zeitgeist of social media, specifically Facebook, where fans proudly share very intimate moments with large numbers of people, it showed how Intel can make that content even more memorable, by creating a beautiful virtual museum of your life. From the simple images displayed on a gallery wall to the 3D room of robots arranging your pictures to form a Chuck Close type image of your face, the experience was mesmerizing. Even the most sanguine of my marketing  friends were blown away. So congrats to Intel for creating an app that speaks clearly to the brand attributes but provides customers with a tool that brings a new immersive experience to their personal lifestory.

Number 2

Tampon Apology  (PER)

It's all about supply and demand..even when it comes to tampons. When the Johnson & Johnson OB Tampons started disappearing from shelves in 2010, consumers were so desperate to get their hands on them that a box that normally sold for under $10 went for $79 on eBay! Once the company realized their customers were so upset,  they had no choice but to issue an apology for discontinuing them. And what a great apology! By typing your name into their site, a handsome guy with a white piano sings a lovely song to you, but that's not all. In the course of the video, your name is written in the sky, in rose petals and even in a tattoo! You can't get any sweeter unless there are white doves. Oh wait, there are white doves! Who wouldn't forgive them? It's ok to admit you're wrong, but it's so right to do that with a tongue in cheek personalized serenade that makes you love the brand!

Number 6

 Mad Men Ad Facebook App   (PER, RWA)

If you love great tv, you probably love MadMen and can't get enough of their incisive wit and '60's styling. Greenberry, an agency in the Netherlands, came up with a brilliant Facebook app that allows users to create a Mad Men-themed ad that incorporates their personal data after completing a creative brief and choosing one of the cool templated designs. And what's even better, the best ads appeared in the Dutch print magazine, BLVD Men, and on billboards in Amsterdam. It's perfectly on brand, yet still allows users to personalize the content. How cool is that? 

<p>MAD MEN AD 

No 5

El Norte Beer: The Best Excuse Ever  (RWA, LBS)

There's just so many reasons to love this campaign because it solves one of the age old issues between Men and Women with first world problems. Men like to go out and drink with the guys, especially after they're married or settled down, women ..not so much.  So Norte Beer takes the guilt out of going out drinking..not that I condone it, but it's perfect for a beer company.  Every time they had a beer, the guys would put the bottle cap into the collection jar, and it would count towards a minute of good deeds sponsored by El Norte. In all 50,000 minutes were donated to restore schools, improve parks, clean up lakes and plant trees. What girl would complain about their guy contributing to those lofty goals? The perfect excuse. 

Click here to see Part 1 and Part 2 of My Top Ten Digital Campaigns for 2011

Number 8

Kraft’s Jello iphone/ipad app  (PER)

It’s certainly not easy to make a 100 year old food product made from animals’ bones, sugar water and artificial coloring relevant to a new audience, but that’s exactly what Kraft did for their gelatin dessert known as Jello.  Rather than highlight its healthful qualities in these days of promoting water as calorie free—Jello has no fat--the campaign focused on its fun factor by creating a free mobile app that’s pure joy. Users select their favorite flavor and then choose any song from your iTunes library, and then watch your favorite Jello dance in time to the music. They even suggest choosing different genres, from Punk to BlueGrass, to watch the Jello groove out. Try it, you'll like it. 

KLM Surprise  (PER, RWA, LBS)

I love KLM even though I've never flown the airline.  And I'm not alone. They have over 600K fans on Facebook, Virgin America under 200K. Here's one great reason why. They not only understand their customers, they appreciate them. Everyone knows that waiting in airports before boarding your plane is unbelievably boring, but KLM thought of a way to change that. Using Foursquare and Twitter to locate KLM  passengers who had checked in at the airport, they surprised them with a personalized gift as a thank you for flying their airline.  

A little surprise goes a long way and the smiles on the faces of the recipients tells one part of the  story, and 1MM impressions on Twitter tells the other side too. Decidedly a brilliant use of all three themes. 

It’s that time of year again. 

Everyone is creating their Top Ten list and it is likely they will have the same viral videos or digital marketing campaigns, e.g., Darth Vader Volkswagen ad, on them.  However, I have assembled a different list, one that is not based on number of views or shares. This is a highly personal list, but very strictly curated.

 The three criteria every campaign had to meet were:

1. Unique - the message was conveyed in a fresh, and unconventional manner..not a rehash of an older campaign
2. Compelling - brands are becoming content creators, so the execution had to be engaging, either in a fun and amusing way, or a serious, but not depressing, fashion
3. Effective -  the message had to be on brand and successful in reaching the intended audience.

While I assembled the list, three key themes emerged from the winners: Personalization (PER), Real World Activation or Trans Media (RWA) and Localization integration (LBS). And as you'll see below, I've indicated how the winning campaigns integrated those themes into their execution. 

I'll be posting two campaigns a day from the list for the next five days. So here we go in descending order. Hopefully you'll find some unexpected gems here.

 Number 10

Moby’s Album Launch for Destroyed (PER RWP LBS) 

These days just launching an album and hoping it will sell is a long gone assumption. Streaming it for free and hoping some folks will pay for it has been around since Radiohead released In Rainbows.  So when Moby launched Destroyed in May, he chose to use the newest and coolest technologies to reach his fans.  By leveraging the streaming functionality through SoundCloud to let fans hear the music, and the sharing functionality of the hugely popular iPhone app, Instagram, the launch became a real time interactive immersive experience. The website provides the RWA and LBS factors through a world map dotted with the photographs taken by Moby that inspired the songs while on tour.  Then adding in the PER, he asked fans to contribute their own Instagram photos to the site, allowing a more personal connection with Moby and his process.  The site has 18K Likes and 3500 tweets, not bad!

 Number 9

Granata Pet Snack Check (RWA, LBS)   

Interactive billboards are not new but using them as Granata has done is brilliant. The objective was to make dog owners aware of their new healthy of dog food.  But their unique strategy was not to target the owners, but rather the dogs. Knowing dogs need to be walked daily, they put up a series of billboards that incented owners to check into them on Foursquare (LBS) as they were walking past with their dogs, which immediately dispensed free dog food (RWA). What dog doesn’t want food? What owner wouldn’t mind free food? Best of all, Granata gets dogs to taste their food without doing the hard sell. Everybody wins.

It’s nothing short of meteoric. Google Plus took only 16 days to reach 10mm users. Facebook took over two years to reach that many fans. And now that G+ is open to anyone, their new user base is estimated at 43 million. Experian/Hitwise stated that last week, visits to G+ increased by almost 1300%, elevating it from no. 54 to no. 8 on the Hitwise Social Networking and Forums Category. And though their numbers have dropped recently, the platform will only get more users as brands come on board.

Worth The Wait

At the launch, brands were upset that only individuals could create pages—(except for two beta partners, Ford and Starbucks), however they will see three clear benefits from the long wait. 

1.     There is a very large audience already familiar with the platform, and in fact, these early adopters are a highly influential group.

2.     Google has been tweaking the platform and features over the past couple of months creating a better user experience overall, with increased functionality, including the addition of games.

3.     The platform is very stable and able to handle large amounts of traffic.

Content Propagatio

There is no doubt that Google, which owns over 65% of all searches, will drive         synergy. However, G+ did borrow the ability of tagging content off of the main site in a  manner similar to Facebook where users can Like external content. G+ has added the +1  tag for interactions on external websites, thereby increasing the visibility and relevancy of  the site for users outside of the network., and there has already been widespread adoption  by sites and users. 

Content Segmentation

With Circles, G+ created a unique tool that allows users to target content to specific groups, and will allow brands to offer specialized content to different user groups, based on customized criteria. Publishers’ whose content is highly relevant and targeted to their audience will see engagement gains as opposed to those who publish generic content on an irregular basis.  Brands may have a Brand Advocate circle, or a Focus Group circle, or possibly just those Coupon circle. This feature will require strong community managers able to make the best use of the nuances of content creation.

Other ways that brands can target their content is through Hangouts and Sparks. Hangouts, which is essentially a video chat tool, only allows 10 users at one time, but may be leveraged by brands to interact with their core audience through a visual real time connection. And although not used much, Sparks is a search tool within G+ allowing users to find relevant content created by those in your circles and allows content to be accessible long after the original publication date.

Content Analytics

An advanced analytics dashboard will be a huge differentiator for G+. Although not fully integrated yet, it is assumed they will leverage their proprietary tools such as Google analytics, Adsense,  and Adwords. This would inevitably allow brands the best in class data and the ability = to drill down into social media analytics to help gauge social media ROI on G+.  

Once realized, the advantages of a Google+ business account may be in the ability to analyze its effectiveness and reach getting what is probably the clearest return-on-investment (ROI) picture of any social media tool to date.  And if leveraged correctly, this information will help guide brands to create the most compelling and relevant content for their users.

With all these benefits, it would seem that brands will be able to set a new engagement level with their customers, making it a “must-have” as part of their marketing mix.

Smart post from @journik. Was W & K so concerned with their own creativity and the medium that they forgot the product, the target audience and the brand positioning?

The early adopters in my network have all heard about Foursquare, and Gowalla and My Town. Launched in March 2009, it was called the "breakout mobile app at SXSW by Mashable (http://mashable.com/2009/03/16/foursquare/), the adoption rate has been astounding, first by users and now by brands such as Bravo and Zagat.

And I'm sure that trend will continue, notwithstanding the fear of advertising that your home is empty and can easily be robbed (http://pleaserobme.com/). More and more people will soon be getting sucked into what Peter Shankman states in his post, "2010--The Year of FourSquare?", the "black tar" that is Foursquare.

However, I have noticed e-tailers are lagging behind, and I have a great solution for them. Just recently I added a few books to my wish list at Amazon, and I thought it would be great to share that on Twitter and Facebook. To do so, I had to open a new tab, copy and paste the link to the book and type the text that I just added such and such to my wish list.

It's really a no brainer that there should be a share button on that Amazon page, and similar pages from all e-tailers. Why not share that you added a movie to your netflix queue. Or that you just purchased new boots from Zappos. Of course in the vein of http://www.pleaserobme.com, I would not recommend tweeting you just purchased a 50' LCD television or brand new Rolls Royce.

Continuing with that model, power users---not just appointed bloggers-- would get badges and discounts, and tell their friends/followers about great deals 

Leveraging brand advocates to reinforce their loyalty and spread the news is what social media is all about. Seems like a no brainer to me, and it's not necessary to forge an alliance with Foursquare, as they already have large customer bases.   Just saying...