Handing out free samples to promote your services is pretty old hat. But then there’s never been a free sample quite like this.
The box itself looks like any other home pregnancy test. But this pregnancy test isn’t for women. It’s for men.

It’s called the ReadyDaddy pregnancy test, and it was distributed on the streets of towns across Israel in May as part of an alternative media campaign for Israeli HMO Clatit, one of the nation’s major medical services.
The HMO wanted to promote its pregnancy services among young couples, but it knew that its message would get lost if it reached out to young women, who are already bombarded with pregnancy-related promotions and advertisements.

“The tests were active, and if a men took the test, the result would always come out ‘not ready’ (unless the man was pregnant),” Eyal Gan-mor, ReadyDaddy was a bit hit with those who received it. A few men actually took the test, and many more logged on to the associated ReadyDaddy web site, which directed surfers to information about Clatit pregnancy services.

The idea and execution are simple, cost-effective and cause-effective. Is it daytime in a tropical climate? Then wear sunblock.
Nivea Sun advertised its product using mirrored billboards that projected copy onto walls, storefronts, car doors, sidewalks and buses, using the sun’s rays as its ink.

From MediaCreativity:

So how do you get consumers to flip for your housecleaning product? Start by persuading them to flip their Twitter posts.
Night Agency crafted a social media campaign that used 200 Soft Scrub “Captains” to build awareness for Soft Scrub TOTAL Kitchen through blogs, Facebook and Twitter.
The tweets stood out from ordinary posts because they’re all upside down, denoting TOTAL Kitchen’s (and Bath & Bowl’s) ability to work when turned upside down, making it easier to clean hard-to-reach places.

From MediaLife:
“It’s all over the news, all the beaches along the Gulf Coast that have been ruined by the BP oil spill.

Yet beaches further down the coast are still pristine, and that’s created a public relations challenge for businesses in those areas. How do you tell the public, specifically vacationers, that your beaches have not been affected?

That was the issue facing the Panama City Beach Convention and Visitor’s Bureau, which was worried that potential tourists would forego a visit to its beaches because of their proximity to the spill.
The bureau hit on an innovative solution: Each morning it uploads pictures of the oil-free Panama City beaches to digital billboards across the Southeast, where most of its tourists hail from.

“Everybody here very much wants to make sure we’re doing everything we can to get the message out that there is no oil along any of the beaches in northwest Florida,” says Dan Rowe, president and CEO of the Panama City Beach Convention and Visitor’s Bureau. “There’s no better way to reassure the public than to show a photo that is live as you can be.”

Thanks to YMCA (and TWBA Vancouver)

[from Mediacreativity]
Picture it: You’re walking through Manhattan and you pass a discarded modern, colorful chair, in good condition. Do you take it home with you?
Anything curbside is fair game to passersby, but what about a chair left inside a park? These questions were answered in November when Blu Dot and its agency Mono concocted a two-day experiment that led up to Blu Dot’s one-year anniversary in its SoHo location.
Over the course of two days, Mono placed 25 brand new “Real Good Chairs” throughout Manhattan, and watched and waited for these chairs to find new homes.
Each chair was GPS-equipped, allowing mono to track the chair’s location and pay a visit to the chairs’ new owners. Can you imagine taking a chair off the sidewalk and having someone ring your doorbell to inquire about the chair?

“The top sticker is a coupon for $5 off any $20 purchase at CVS. The coupon pulls off to reveal a second sticker, an ad for CVS that stays on the bill when it leaves your wallet and goes back into circulation.”

Well done, very targeted.

Original version.
Version accepted by CBS (for the SuperBowl).

Actually, the second tagline is better …
… every once in awhile censorship makes things better, in ADV.