Yesterday, tipped off by a tweet from Geoff Livingston, I learned about USA Today’s latest iteration of its What America Wants brand campaign: #AmericaWants Hashtag Campaign.  The  paper is offering a one day, full size color ad in its weekday (Monday-Thursday) print edition, valued at $189,400 to a charity that receives the most tweets to the line:  ”#americawants (insert charity name) to win a full page ad in USA Today.”

The campaign is a mix of brand and cause marketing: it is reinforcing through its proscribed tweet script its trade campaign while simultaneously attempting to tap into American’s desire to … Read more