Brickfish Campaign Chosen by Microsoft Celebrates Windows Brand Ambassadors

Three Phase Campaign Rewards Brand Evangelists



SAN DIEGO – Brickfish, the social media marketing solution, and Microsoft have teamed up for a three-phase social media campaign around its Windows and Windows Live products. Located at http://www.brickfish.com/Windows, the “Windows Brand Ambassador” campaign will begin with a Call for Entries, in which entrants are asked to create photos, videos or blogs that showcase why they use PC’s and / or should be Windows Brand Ambassadors. Of all eligible entries, the top 200 highest scoring entries will advance to the Semi-Finals where they will be voted on by the community. From the top 100, as voted on by the community, the Windows Social Media Team will choose 40 Semi-Finalists as Windows Brand Ambassadors for the next eight weeks. During the next eight weeks, the 40 Windows Brand Ambassadors will receive weekly video challenges from Microsoft. Each week’s challenge will highlight a different way the Windows Brand Ambassadors use Windows every day. The winner of each challenge will be selected by relevancy of their response, creativity, and the volume of viral buzz they generate during that week’s challenge. The Windows Social Media Team will choose one of the “Windows Brand Ambassadors” as the grand prize winner, and will reward them with a trip for two to Microsoft’s main campus in Redmond, WA. For more information on judging criteria, visit http://www.brickfish.com/Pages/Comps/Rules/Lifestyles/Lifestyles_WindowsBrandAmbassador.pdf.

“I’m very excited to announce the launch of our Windows Brand Ambassador program,” said Marty Collins, Group Marketing Manager of the Windows Social Media Team. “To do this, we’re back again with Brickfish. Our first engagement with them last fall, the ‘I’m a PC campaign,’ was so successful we’ve teamed up again. This time, we are looking for 40 highly engaged, enthusiastic fans to help us tell our Windows story.”

In addition to receiving a trip to Microsoft’s Main Campus, the grand prize winner will also receive a HP Touchsmart laptop and a Canon – Powershot 10.0-Megapixel Digital Camera. The Windows Social Media Team will also award a “Windows Brand Ambassador” each week, with a $100 gift certificate to Best Buy, for best completing the challenge that week.

Brickfish social media campaigns enable brands and agencies to launch online marketing campaigns that get consumers engaged in a meaningful brand dialogue. Consumers create exciting, personalized brand-focused user-generated content (UGC) and then virally share the campaign and their content with their vast social networks via widgets, IM, blogs, email and more. Campaign participants interact with the brand campaign in a variety of ways that include creating, reviewing, sharing, voting upon, and watching brand-relevant content. This powerful viral marketing vehicle generates extensive brand awareness, engagement, reach and results.

“Brickfish is excited to partner with Microsoft for the second time, and to help them increase their sales by engaging with their consumers in relevant conversations online,” said Nichole Goodyear, president/CEO and co-founder of Brickfish. “The ‘Windows Brand Ambassador’ campaign is great way for Microsoft to harness the power of its existing brand evangelists and to ignite new brand evangelists across the Internet.”

The Contest is open to US residents who are 18 years or older. The Call for Entries ends June 1. The Semi-Finals will begin on June 9 and will end on July 7. The Finals will begin on July 14 and end on September 8. For complete rules and regulations, visit http://www.brickfish.com/Pages/Comps/Rules/Lifestyles/Lifestyles_WindowsBrandAmbassador.pdf. For more information about Brickfish, visit www.brickfish.com/company.

About Brickfish®

Brickfish®, a leading social media advertising network, enables brand advertisers to reach their target audience on the social Web through viral marketing campaigns that engage consumers in a meaningful brand dialogue. Consumers create exciting, personalized brand-focused user-generated content (UGC) and then virally share the campaign and their content with their vast social networks via widgets, blogs, IM, email, and hundreds more. Additional campaign participants interact with the brand by creating, reviewing, sharing, voting upon, and watching brand-relevant content. All of these brand engagements are tracked with patent-pending Viral Map™ and Geo View technologies, which provide detailed data on the reach, engagement, and viral activity of each campaign across the Web and geographically. Brickfish uses an exclusive Cost Per Engagement® (CPE®) model for pricing and measuring consumer participation in online advertising campaigns. Brickfish has launched successful campaigns for some of the world’s premier brands, including Kodak, Nike, Samsung, Coach, Givenchy, The North Face®, Intuit, Qualcomm, and more.