The High Notes of 09: The CMmy Awards Honor the Best of the Year

Forget about the Oscars or the Emmys. Here's the CMmys — our editors' takes on what from 2009 marketers should emulate, celebrate or have a big old heapin' cup o' schadenfreude about.

FASTEST FINGER FOOD: PIZZA HUT'S IPHONE APP

You can argue with the pizza, or the strategy of cross-selling hot wings or pasta to someone looking for pepperoni and cheese-stuffed crust. But you can't argue with success. The Pizza Hut app for the iPhone booked $1 million in sales for the nation's biggest pizza chain in just three months since its launch as a free download. The company already had a mobile site and widgets for online ordering, but the performance of the smartphone-specific app has outstripped them all. One likely key is the app's play value, thanks to the iPhone touch screen. You want to load that puppy up with sausage, black olives and pineapple? Just drop and drag. (Careful though; the sausage icon is very hard to distinguish from the ground beef.) The fact that customers currently get a 20% discount on products ordered via the app doesn't exactly drag down takeup. Nor does having the app feature prominently in one of those app-heavy iPhone ads. Rivals are reportedly scurrying to respond, but so far the closest they've come is Domino's iPhone-optimized Web site. — Brian Quinton

MOST CONTAGIOUS SOUNDING CABLE NETWORK: SYFY

In March, the Sci-Fi Channel rebranded itself as Syfy — same pronunciation, but infinitely more trademarkable. Sure, the new moniker was meant to make the network more inclusive beyond the “living in their mom's basements” crowd. But, online, many in the core geeky and proud target demographic decried the renaming as a slap in the face, some going so far as to say the new name sounded more reminiscent of syphilis than fantasy. Personally, we liked the more seamless cable rebranding Nickelodeon did, redubbing Noggin as Nick Jr. and The N as Nick Teen. Still, Syfy must be doing something right: New programming like “Warehouse 13” has given the channel some of its highest ever ratings. — Beth Negus Viveiros

BEST POSTMASTER GENERAL'S COMEUPPANCE: NEW VIABILITY FOR ALTERNATIVE DELIVERY

More than 20 years have passed since then-Postmaster General Anthony Frank described alternate delivery systems as “winos hanging things on doorknobs.” Perhaps 2010 will be the year of the winos' revenge, as several new schemes for circumventing the U.S. Postal Service debuted in 2009. There's UPS's “Direct to Door” service, which piggybacks insert media into packages sent out by its marketer clients. (Granted, this is sometimes to the mailing marketers' chagrin, especially when competitors' messages are included among the inserts.) There's also Zumbox, a new service that has linked an e-mail address to every postal address in America, allowing for digital message delivery, virtual and real-world matchback ability and geo-targeting capabilities — once consumers are made aware of, and activate, their accounts. And, of course, there are still winos. — Richard H. Levey

MOST SCREAMED-FOR CONTENT: “PARANORMAL ACTIVITY”'S ON-DEMAND DISTRIBUTION

How do you turn a $15,000 movie into an international hit grossing $65 million? Let the crowd decide which markets it should be released in, building buzz in the process. That was the tack taken by “Paranormal Activity,” a low-budget shocker from first-time director Oren Peli. The movie opened in a handful of college towns. But distributor Paramount built a page on Eventful.com, a local entertainment Web community that solicits visitors' votes to bring acts and movies to specific markets. The “Demand It!” tag was heavily featured in TV spots for the movie, at the end of its several online trailers, and on the main Web site. As the votes came in, the studio rolled out the movie to 20 additional cities and then widened the release further. They also promised that when demand on the Eventful.com site hit 1 million votes, the picture would get a full-blown national release. That mark was reached three weeks after the initial debut. Psychological experts point out that human consistency makes the “pull” system a good gauge of customer demand; having clicked a button to demand that a picture be made available, audiences will usually follow through and buy a ticket when the movie is available. — BQ

MOST ABUSED ONLINE TACTIC: FRIENDSHIP

One online friend posted “HULK SMASH BOOKFACE!” as a response to a slew of glitches Facebook was experiencing this fall. We love this phrase, as it's just how we feel about folks who friend us, only to use their status updates to continually hawk their own blog, Web site or business. Likewise, we instantly smash (okay, ignore) friend requests from people we've never heard of, much less had any contact with. If you don't know me, you don't need to know about my kid's school play or the five people I'd like on my side in a bar fight, okay. — BNV

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