Doug Schumacher, Basement, Inc.
Brand Name: LetsTalk's ToneMine
Agency: Basement, Inc.
URL: http://www.tonemine.com/
What is unusual and effective about this website?
ToneMine enables people to quickly generate fun, uniquely personalized ringtones. The idea is that someone can visit the site and within 3-5 minutes, have created their first ringtone. They can also mash-up someone else's ringtone.
Any ringtone can be sent to their phone, shared with the community or their friends, or posted via a widget that plays the ringtone.
As an acquisition tool, the site is building a database of mobile enthusiasts, who are in turn generating an ongoing library of unique ringtones.
How does the website fit into and complement the overall brand strategy for the company?
ToneMine directly supports LetsTalk's brand position of "wireless advocate" by offering mobile enthusiasts a creative way to add uniqueness and personality to their mobile phone. It builds awareness within a key target audience in an area where their top competitor has been very silent.
The site has also created opportunities for alliances with other communities and brands. An example is the recent Battle of the Ringtone DJs contest with DJ Tutor, a large online community of DJs. This brought in BlackBerry as a sponsor, spiking the contest with valuable prizes and additional publicity.
How would you improve this website?
The library of sounds has expanded quickly, and the ability to manage the full set of sounds is more and more difficult. This is key to the user experience and would be a priority for v2 of the site.
Brand Name: Coca-Cola's Design the World a Coke
Agency: AKQA
URL: www.coca-cola.com/olympics/
What is unusual and effective about this website?
What I like first and foremost is the simplicity of this idea -- design a Coke bottle. It's fast, and it leverages what's probably the greatest package design since the egg. That potential is all summed up very well on the initial page. One glance and I get it. The designs others have posted are creative and inspiring. They make me want to join in.
The tools are easy to use, something most UGC sites fall far short of. And of course, once I've finished, I can post my design quite easily to the top social networking sites or anywhere else I want via the embed widget.
How does the website fit into and complement the overall brand strategy for the company?
Coke's advertising has always been about bringing people together, and it has always had a strong global sensibility. One of the first things I noticed when I started traveling the world is that there are Coke signs everywhere, and Pepsi signs nowhere. So, from the title of the site down to features like viewing submissions by country, this site is a good extension to a long history of consistent brand messaging.
How would you improve this website?
I'd probably try and reward the participants. I don't doubt that there are a lot of people who are perfectly happy just creating their own Coke bottle. But given the Olympics tie-in, and the idea of bringing the people of the world together being a key theme for both the brand and the Olympics, giving greater recognition to the leading designs would be a nice focal point for the community.
Doug Schumacher is president of Basement, Inc.
Nanette Marcus is cover stories editor at iMedia Connection.
