Expedia: Find your story

Nothing amazing here, it's basically a generated paralax site with some streetview thrown in but the execution is slick, simple and nicely implemented in Facebook.

https://apps.facebook.com/expediafindyourstory/

Volvic: Team Volcanicity

The classic competition mechanic where you send in your details, pimp yourself to your friends and family for votes and then become an ambassador for the brand. Which means free content for them...

The problem as usual is that if you do not win then you will not care for the winner's content because let's face it, they are having fun and you are not...

Still it's worth a shot...and at least they are prizes to grab for voting.

https://www.facebook.com/VolvicUK?v=app_254553244581393&rest=1

Hunter: Together Through Any Weather

Classic users submitted content competition asking people to upload photos based on a daily theme, this being on FB and with the love for Instagram people have at the moment this should do well.

Trouble is sometime the prize isn't existing enough, today it was all about fleece welly socks, am not the target audience so therefore am not interested.

http://goo.gl/vyYZX

PG Tips: To Monkey with Love

Do I really still need to "Like" you page to enter a competition? haven't we moved on? (support the cause here http://goo.gl/0mzPQ)

I know PG tips is supposed to be simple and fun for the all family but it does look like monkeys have actually designed and coded the tab. I clicked an heart by mistake and I can not undo this! I have an high resolution monitor but if you select an entry at the bottom of the page you have to scroll all the way up to see it.

Frustrating...but the people seems happy sending monkey some love, does it help selling the product? no, does it keep the fans engage? yes and that's why PG is one of the top UK brand on Facebook.

https://www.facebook.com/PGtips/app_132696750208199

Intel: The Beauty Inside

Taking its concept from an underground movement of digital film makers creating stories together, Intel is trying to bound everyone and create the ultimate social movie.

Apart from the people selected and their mums I don't see why the general public will spend time on the FB page watching the auditions and then follow the film (If you want a great audition video watch this). Most of these auditions are from under 16 to probably haven't got the catch to buy an Intel PC at the moment.

https://www.facebook.com/thebeautyinsidefilm

Coca-cola: Toe Tappy

For god sake, when will this madness of dance moves stop? It's the summer so Coke is trying to own the dance floor by crowd sourcing a dance move.

I hate the idea of it, still it's seems that the campaign has been successful thanks to a big PR push. When you actually look at the view on Youtube it seems that apart from the big commercials that have over 1 millions views or 3 millions for the one that feature Carmen Electra and Perez Hilton (they will do anything these 2) the rest of the entries range from 100's to 1000's, have a look here http://www.youtube.com/user/CokeZeroDance/videos?sort=p&view=0. For a brand like Coke this is, in my view, some poor results.

What can we learn from this?  UGC is dead and manage your expectations in terms of numbers, if not have a plan B (I think Carmen Electra is free next week).

http://www.makeitpossibleproject.com/

Samsung: Unleash your Fingers

From the viral videos to the website; they could not go wrong, using the most famous "Finger Tutting"  (I still think this is a shit name to describe this activity) artist on the globe and Justice for the soundtrack.

The website is slick with everything that you hope for to learn and remix and create videos to spread the message even further. Doesn't innovate but do the job really well.



http://www.unleashyourfingers.com

McDonald: Coffeetime

Great concept, really badly executed, they could have partnered with Instagram or similar, they could have actually put the real time of the photo, they could have try to use the actual Facebook timeline too. What a shame.

https://apps.facebook.com/mcdscoffeetime/

Levis: #iamlevis

A really cheap campaign to produce but with with Instagram 13m+ users am sure they are onto a winner.

http://statigr.am/tag/iamlevis

Wonka Wrapper

In principle the idea should be fun, in practically it doesn't work as you can not hold the pack and use your mouse at the same time in an elegant manner. Also the reaction time is poor. So what do you get in the end? lots of video of kids that don't know what to do.

https://apps.facebook.com/wonkawrapper/

Just Dance 3: Autodance

A bit like Songify in a way but for videos. The kids will love it for sure!

http://www.youtube.com/JD3Autodance

Evian: Let's baby dance

Let's not forget the original dancing baby! nevertheless this is perfect for the audience as he doesn't required anything else than being in front of your webcam and do a bit of 3 frames of me. They are doing 4 just to be on the legal site am sure. Sadly a catchy tune and hey presto everyone is a winner...genius really...

http://www.letsbabydance.evian.com/

Carlsbergs: Unbottle Yourself

Hey Cadbury...this is how it's done, just had alcohol, silly games, Facebook connect and a cool app!

The prize is not even that amazing and the site could be so much better but people like to be stupid.

http://www.unbottleyourself.com/

Spots Vs Stripes: Big Race

I have difficulty engaging with the campaign but you have to appreciated that they though of some simple challenges to raise participation. It looks like most of the content is still coming from the off-line events.

http://www.spotsvstripes.com/raceseason/default.aspx

CNN Ireport

Not a campaign as such but a lot of good UGC ideas in there. From personal profile, to comments to sharing a lot of effort as be made to make the navigation easy even if I think a simple next and previous would help a lot when viewing articles!

http://ireport.cnn.com/

Behind the mask

I don't see how this is going to work, minimum specs is 320x240?

An animated storyboard is not enough am afraid for people to really understand, I can even found the music for the song, there is no blog telling you how the project is going, nothing to let you know when this is going to close, no preview or gallery, it's a mess...

http://behindthemask.michaeljackson.com

Hula Hoops Talent Class

This must have kept the agency busy for months, kaching!

So what have we got here:

Home page: Back to the 80's with the animations, I like your style

UGC: upload your talent? overdone but am sure all the sados that can make it to the auditions might give it a go. you have to register first, what a shame...looking a fool for 10k? is it worth it? If only the winner was going straight to the final now that would have been a proper competition / collaboration not just a branding exercise.

Vote: See above, good that you can search by username but registering to vote? Hey Mr Hoops are you sure you are actually going to do something with all this data, are you going to spam everyone after?. Make sure you email noreply@hulahoops.com just to be on the safe side hey!

Get inspired: Shit download, thank you

Claim free talent lesson: ha the big offline offering!  Why can you not have done this with postcode and google map? shall I start to go on about how small the box is and that you should shoot your art director? shall I start that, really, the consumer has to do all the work and that its basically a con from the stage school to try and get you to enroll your child and pay £20 for each 25mn to 90mn session after that.

http://talent.hulahoops.com/

Uniqlooks

Facebook integration taken to the next level or just a place to found hot chicks and become a stalker?

Will be interesting to see once actual people post really rubbish photos of themselves.

http://uniqlooks.uniqlo.com

Raise the Maltesers

1. UGS campaigns are over done
2. Make sure you remove tests videos
3. Stop filming fake videos in your agency corridor
4. Try to have the budget to go from Z list celebrities to Y list celebrities
5. Don't tell the consumer the product is made in Slough
6. Remove the age restriction to see the ads, nobody is going to sue you
7. Stop lecturing people of having an healthy lifestyle, we are not morons
8. If a section is not ready do not put in online, it just reinforce the fact that you did not push the client for a sign-off in time.
9. Don't put the Flash demo of your iphone game when it's going to look that tiny and, well, shit to play
10. Don't do an app for the sake of it, unless people can donate via it
11. Make sure you check your link so I don't see an HTTP 404 error
12. Tell your client to switch agency

http://maltesers.co.uk/

Goo Dare Wins

Everyone love Creme Egg as a brand so why all their website look so badly designed? too much copy, too much way of getting lost.

Integrating them into the Spots Vs Stripes campaign is a good idea even if it could confuse people if not explain properly.

Get read of all the clutter and you have an old school user generated content competition as the core of the campaign.

http://www.cremeegg.com/Default.aspx