Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Wendy’s Frosty Gets a Social Media Infusion

From Mashable:

With summer around the corner, the Wendy’s fast food chain is releasing a slew of social media promotions and incentives centered around its iconic Frosty desert treat.

The company will roll out three distinct social media promotions over the course of the summer that involve Twitter and Foursquare. Each endeavor, however, revolves around Facebook and the Frosty Facebook Page.

Wendy’s is also touching all corners of the social sphere with action-oriented contests for prizes and a fan-powered charity drive. It’s tit-for-tat marketing at its best, with social media designed to drive awareness around the brand and reward fan appreciation.

The Frosty Summer Social Tour

On Monday, Wendy’s launched Frosty Summer Vacation, the first of three Frosty-themed initiatives. Frosty is going on vacation and will use its Facebook Page — which already has close to 600,000 fans — to leave hints about its whereabouts. It’s essentially a digital scavenger hunt that runs through June 6.

Users 18 and up can access the application — which is live now — via the “Win” tab and sign up to tackle the challenge to find Frosty. After completing the registration form, Facebook users then gain access to a travel journal where they can view Frosty’s postcards and store each of the six letter stamps — one for each letter in Frosty — as they collect them.

Frosty will reveal clues as to how to locate individual stamps using digital postcards, and fans will receive a postcard from Frosty every few days. The first hint for finding the “F” stamp is already live, and it directs users to navigate through Frosty’s collection of Wall photos on Facebook. Users who collect a single letter are entered into a drawing to a $25.00 gift card, while those who collect all the stamps could win the grand prize: a trip for two to Hawaii or Alaska.

Once Frosty Summer Vacation comes to a close, the company will release its Treat it Forward application to raise money for the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption (DTFA). The initiative kicks off on June 7 and runs through June 20.

The campaign is timed to coincide with Father’s Day. Fans can participate in the social media charity drive and donate 50 cents to the DFTA by using the Treat it Forward application. Fans can pay it forward by with a #TreatItFwd hashtag tweet, a virtual Frosty Facebook gift, a Foursquare checkin at a Wendy’s restaurant or a Father’s day e-card created on Frostycard.com. For each fan action, Wendy’s will donate 50 cents to the DTFA in an effort to raise $50,000 with help from online brand fans.

Wendy’s is planning to contribute to the foundation via in-store promotions as well, so for every Frosty purchased on June 19 and 20, the company will donate 50 cents to the DTFA. In total, the company plans to raise $4.5 million for the foundation.

To close out the summer, Wendy’s will be inviting fans to share photos, videos and stories on how they enjoy Frostys for the Frosty Project. A custom Frosty Project Facebook application will launch on June 21 so that Frosty fans can use it to submit their digital Frosty memorabilia and other users can vote on the submissions they like best.

The company will award prizes — like Kindles and iPads — based on the most popular submissions. The contest runs through July 18, with voting taking place from July 19 to August 18. Winners will be announced on August 19.

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