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 [...]

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 [...]

You know this much by now: if it’s Friday and you’re on the Awesome Blog, there’s a good chance you’ll be reading about some awesome projection executions. But, before you dismiss us as being a little too predictable, admit that you didn’t expect us to be covering slingshots in the same post, right? Meet the [...]

There’s a reason that display ads (formerly known as banner ads) often leave a bad taste in consumers’ mouths: so many of them are just outright terrible. Cluttering up a user’s screen with dancing babies hocking insurance or flashing banners claiming we’ve won an iPod devalue the medium as a whole, which is a shame, [...]

We admit it, Samsung. We’re impressed. A couple of weeks ago, we sang your praises for your excellent use of projection, and gave you props for supplementing your event marketing with foursquare. But you couldn’t stop there, could you? You knew we were a sucker for those Youtube takeovers, which always end up being immersive [...]

And you don’t need to consume any of Amsterdam’s famous Space Pastries to see it! Nah, it’s another fantastic projection, of course. In this case, there’s a brand behind the magic, as Samsung used this tactic to introduce their new 3D LED TVs. The captivating projection was complemented with a station where pedestrians could see [...]

These days, it’s hard to know how we’re supposed to feel about graffiti. Is it art? Even if it is art, should we remove it? But the one thing we can agree on is that we don’t want to encourage folks to tag walls willy-nilly, right? Well, not anymore. The above video shows a “Tangible [...]

About a week ago, we talked a bit about the tendency for some shiny objects to distract from a campaign’s message. As always, we mentioned that we prefer the simple ideas, brilliantly activated. Like the campaign pictured to the right, for instance. We don’t need to say much for you to get it, other than [...]

Among our 10 Trends for 2010, Delighting Consumers with Hidden Surprises was, admittedly, the longshot. It seemed reasonable to predict that many brands and retailers would tire of going bigger and brighter in order to break through marketing clutter, and would instead look to deliver small happiness in unexpected ways. However, we recognized that this [...]

While we all hope that brands continue to think about the environmental implications of their packaging, let’s be honest here – it’s generally not a very sexy topic. Conversations about reduced carbon footprints are often communicated as stuffy PR pieces which, while commendable, are hardly worth sharing. That’s what makes the above video from Puma [...]