Having caught you up on all things foursquare, you’ve now got a pretty good handle on how marketers are handling the rise of this location-based social network. Of course, foursquare’s not the only game in town. While the world figures out what to make of Facebook Places, Gowalla continues to be the best LBS alternative [...]

With Facebook recently unveiling their own location-based service, the press has itself in a tizzy trying to wrap its head around the impending arrival of the year of location. Y’know, the one we called out back in March. But no worries, we’re glad you’re all coming around. In fact, we’re going to spend the next [...]

Delighting consumers. Hidden surprises. We’ve mentioned them once or twenty times here on the Awesome Blog. But, underlying this trend was the idea that brands touting “big happiness” would struggle to deliver upon that promise in a period of great uncertainty and skepticism. When we introduced the trend, we felt that brands would best succeed [...]

After all our talk of QR codes and Stickybits and barcode marketing, we’d be remiss if we didn’t take a second to pat ourselves on the back here at Upshot. As part of Pacifico’s sponsorship of the US Open of Surfing, we rolled out a program via QR code for the event’s attendees. Better yet, [...]

In our lengthy coverage of QR codes and barcode marketing in general, we’ve repeatedly referenced Stickybits without ever diving into how the platform actually works. There’s a reason for that – a couple, actually. But, with Doritos, Pepsi, Ben & Jerry’s, and other CPG giants flirting with the service, we certainly owe them a glance [...]

That’s right – it’s time for another Potty Posting! This time, we tackle barcode marketing, including our old friend the QR code. As always, a PDF version is available here, which we encourage you to share with clients and colleagues. But, if you’d prefer the straight text, continue reading below.

After last year’s SXSW Interactive conference, when our heads were still spinning with augmented reality apps and location-based social networks and gesture based technologies, we came to an unexpected conclusion: many of the most engaging consumer interactions were being delivered via plain ol’ streaming videos. Part of this success was attributable to steadily-improving content, but [...]

Right before our break, we took a deeper look into how corporate social responsibility looks in the world of the Reputation Economy, where a brand’s (or a house of brands’) seemingly disparate actions are judged by consumers as a single experience. In the post, we pointed out that Pepsi’s notable efforts as part of their [...]

We all knew that Pepsi’s Refresh project was a risky proposition. Their decision to ditch their million-dollar Superbowl ads opened the door for their rivals at Coke to advertise essentially unopposed during the country’s biggest broadcast. Furthermore, while many have commended Pepsi’s authentic, interactive approach to corporate social responsibility, there’s still no guarantee that this [...]

Many of our conversations about Immersive Sensory Experiences have focused on physical experiences: 3D projections, gesture-response technologies, and other interactive tactics that completely indulge the senses. But, there’s no reason to think these principles are restricted to the offline world. While touch, smell, and taste are (hopefully) inaccessible online, clever digital marketers can still take [...]