Soft Scrub Launches Webisode from Apprentice Tie-In
The Dial Corp. is letting consumers create an ending to a Webisode it created during its task sponsorship on The Apprentice: Los Angeles.
Apprentice teams were tasked with creating a 45-second Webisode to support Dial’s Soft Scrub Deep Clean Foaming Bathroom Cleaner product.
“This is a new product for us in the bathroom cleaning category,” said Ryan Gaspar,
associate brand manager of Soft Scrub. “We wanted to blow this out as much as possible and drive awareness and trial of our product. The Apprentice was a great entity to tie in to.”
In the Webisode, Tim Urban and his teammate, Nicole D’Ambrosio, clean a bathroom using the Soft Scrub product. It ends when Urban drops to one knee as if he were going to propose while D’Ambrosio announces she got a job in New York and she is moving.
Visitors to SoftScrub.com can help Urban decided whether to propose or dump D’Ambrosio by recording an answer for him via a toll-free number or an online message.
The endings can be sent to a friend, posted on MySpace.com or at the site to be viewed by others. The Webisode mimics the on-show love connection between a real- Urban and D’Ambrosio.
Also on the site, a 50 cent coupon off coupon can be downloaded. In-store coupons and more than 20,000 floor displays support the tie to the show.
Soft Scrub is using its Apprentice tie in and the Webisode to hype up its new product.
Not only that, Dial has launched a sweepstakes on SoftScrub.com offering a grand-prize trip to Los Angeles and lunch with the hunks of NBC’s daytime soap Passions. The passions set was where the Apprentice team received their assignments to create the Webisodes.
The Get Passionate About Deep Cleaning promotion runs through May 15. NBC handles the sweepstakes.
In addition, 50,000 samples were sent to people who visited model homes for KB Homes, another show sponsor. KB Homes supplied the houses where the Webisodes were filmed.
“We used our Apprentice sponsorship as a centerpiece of the program, but we really made a 360-degree marketing plan around it,” said Kara Tobin, advertising and consumer promotions manager Dial. “We weren’t relying on the fact of doing one product integration in one show. We wanted to extend it and make it bigger to give consumers more touch points.”
Online materials support the promotion. The Dowd Agency, New York, handles PR, OMD, Chicago, handles the media buy.
Dial returns in April on The Apprentice, launching a sampling effort with KB Homes around its Renuzit Super Odor Neutralizer. In that episode, teams will create a 60-second TV spot for the product that will be broadcast as a movie-style promotion at AMC theaters.
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