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Toyota Motor Sales on Monday launched its youth-oriented economy car Yaris with an integrated campaign from Publicis Groupe’s Saatchi & Saatchi, including 10-second “mobisodes” - video episodes on mobile devices - and interactive banner ad games, reports AdWeek (via MarketingVOX). The games allow players to duel, using Yaris models. The mobisodes feature cartoonish Yaris fights and Matrix-like sets. The traditional commercials and the seven original-content mobisodes lead up to a two-minute grand finale, all created through Saatchi by London-based digital media boutique Tokyo Plastic.
Toyota’s mobisode promotion is a joint effort with Fox, linking the Yaris brand with the network’s new drama “Prison Break,” writes MediaPost. Toyota’s shorts will precede a series of 26 two-minute Fox mobisodes, titled “Prison Break: Proof of Innocence,” which will also integrate the Yaris brand. The Fox mobisodes will be released to Sprint mobile subscribers up to four times a week.
“In this entire campaign, creative and media blur the line,” David Murphy, president of Saatchi in Torrance, Calif., is quoted by AdWeek as saying. “Anyone who says TV is dead, hold the phone: There’s your TV.”
Peter Kang, director of interactive and emerging technology at Saatchi, said the Yaris launch “kick-starts Toyota’s gaming strategy.” The title sponsorship (”Evolution… powered by Yaris”) of the Evolution Fighting Championships (a console-game fighting tournament) this summer marks Toyota’s foray into tournament gaming.
Though off-air online and experiential advertising grew modestly as a part of the overall radio revenue pie, and election-related political ads increased in Q3, total radio ad revenues were down 9% to $4.97 billion for Q3 and down 10% for…
Glamour magazine is running its photo of Britney Spears not only on the cover of the U.S. edition, but on the covers in seven other countries, as well.
Britney will grace Russia, Sweden and Greece’s editions of Glamour, among others.…
Titan Worldwide has signed a five-year deal with the Delaware River Port Authority to manage out-of-home advertising for the Port Authority Transit corp.
The contract covers advertising on PATCO’s rail service and stations between Southern New Jersey and Philadelphia, writes Mediaweek.…
Publicis has acquired full-service agency W&K Communications, continuing its Asia expansion that began several years ago.
W&K will be pulled under the umbrella of Publicis’s Burnett agency network, and will be renamed Leo Burnett Beijing Advertising, writes Adweek.
Other recent Publicis…
With only four weeks separating Thanksgiving and Christmas this year, Cyber Monday One (December 1) and Cyber Monday Two (December 
may command a greater share of online sales than they have in years past - thus increasing the importance…
Top American non-luxury auto brands received higher ratings and less negative comments from online consumers than competing Japanese brands, according to an analysis of consumer opinions collected from automotive review websites by Biz360, MarketingCharts reports.
The research, which aggregated a year’s…
