Microsite.com

The sweepstakes. Ah, yes, that ultimate fallback marketing concept. I guess when you have nothing to differentiate your product or service, run a sweepstakes.

Apparently, there are plenty of companies with no points of difference. Let’s start with Budget Rental Car, just for fun. It launched a Microsite at flipforbudget.com where it asked visitors to shoot a short video that demonstrates how the average Budget car renter can live the budget-savvy lifestyle while on a vacation or road trip. The person who submitted the most original video would win $25,000. That certainly is an original idea.

Equal to the task, Dibs Ice Cream Snacks offered teenagers a chance to win $10,000 if they submitted 30- to 45-second videos that incorporate its product. Oh, the top prize will be awarded based on originality. Check out the Microsite at www.dibsfilmfest.com.

Nestlé, that billion-dollar conglomerate with the resources, I would think, to hire the most creative thinkers in the world, is asking teens and tweens to upload videos of themselves singing original lyrics about its new Giant Chewy Nerds candy. The person who submits the most original song gets to fly to LA, yada, yada. The contest is hosted at Microsite www.wonka.com.

The examples, sorry to say, seem to be endless. These were just on my desktop, and it’s a sunny Friday in August, and I’m headed to the beach. But I digress.

Where the hell are the creative folks? Do they all work at Crispin?

I guess marketing has its own version of “Jump the Shark.” It’s the sweepstakes.

When you’re out of ideas or not in the mood to think too hard, ask your target audience to submit an “original” [fill in medium of choice] that features your product.

And if that doesn’t work, try the quickly emerging ultimate fallback marketing concept II: Ask your target audience to upload pictures of themselves and superimpose their heads on to [insert creative execution of choice]. Folks, we’ve all done the ElfYourself - SimpsonizeMe thing. Now can we please put our thinking caps back on, Chevy, Heineken… The list is long, but I don’t want to work too hard today by looking up their correct URLs. Maybe I should run a sweepstakes.