Office Max has renewed its viral Elf Yourself holiday campaign.
People can create their own dancing elves at http://ElfYourself.com by adding faces to the animated character. Visitors can load up to four images to send on to friends and family. Voices can be added by calling a toll-free number to record a message.
And new this year, revelers can send a dancing Scrooge from http://www.ScroogeYourself.com.
“It’s become something like Frosty or Rudolph, a Christmas icon,” said Bob Thacker, senior vice president, marketing and advertising for Office Max, Inc.
Office Max is using the campaign to “get people to connect” with the company, Thacker said.
“It’ about building excitement around the brand,” he added. “It’s intended to bring feet in the door.”
This is the second year of the Elf Yourself campaign. Office Max gained lots of attention when it rolled out the viral promotion last year. People created 11 million elves in all. The Web site drew 36 million visitors in the five weeks the promotion ran.
Already, Office Max has surpassed those numbers.
As of yesterday, more than 38.7 million elves had been created with more than 58 million people having visited the site. Visitors spend an average of seven minutes interacting with the microsite, Office Max said.
“It’s taken on an even bigger life than it did last year,” Thacker said.
The campaign runs through early January. Online marketing and in-store flyers are promoting the campaign. Toy and EVB handle the campaign for Office Max.
Office Max won Promo’s Interactive Marketing Award for Viral Promotion for the Elf Yourself campaign last year (Promo, May 2007).
http://promomagazine.com/interactivemarketing/marketing_eight_ways_win/index.html
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