Consumers Put Their Heads Together to Create Ads for, er, um, Other Consumers

Forget about everyday delusions and the madness of popular crowds. Madison Avenue in the new year continues to be mad for asking the crowds to help create advertising.

The trend is known as crowdsourcing and it often encompasses the use of content created by consumers, called consumer-generated content. Sometimes the crowd asked to source the ads is composed of professional or would-be professional ad makers rather than citizen-consumers.

Asking consumers to pitch in can “tap into a fresh sense of independence and creativity,” said Barry Sands, senior brand manager for brand-building for the I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter line of spreads sold by Unilever.

A 60-second spot for the line, scheduled to make its debut during the return of “American Idol” on Fox on Tuesday, includes video clips created by eight bloggers.

The clips were among those submitted by 30 bloggers who were asked by Unilever to produce their versions of a video for the line that features the actress Megan Mullally singing “Turn the Tub Around” to the tune of the disco song “Turn the Beat Around.”

There is also a sweepstakes on a Web site that pits the video clips from 16 bloggers against each other; consumers who vote for their favorite clip are eligible to win prizes like a trip to meet Ms. Mullally and get a style make-over.

Agencies involved in the I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter campaign include Mindshare Entertainment and the Zocalo Group.

The California Milk Processor Board, which originated the “Got milk?” campaign, is turning to California teenagers for a campaign. The teens were asked through the public high schools they attend to create video clips that echo a scene from a 20-minute mock rock opera, “Battle for Milkquarious,” introduced last fall by the milk board’s agency, Goodby, Silverstein & Partners.

Ten finalists high schools were selected and beginning this week, computer users can visit a Web site (milkquarious.com) to vote for their favorite video. Each school is guaranteed a $2,500 prize, to be applied to its arts program, for being a finalist.

The top vote-getter will win $20,000 and the runner up will receive $10,000, for a total outlay by the milk board of $50,000.

The Colorado Tourism Office, hoping to borrow a page from a popular contest sponsored by the Australian state of Queensland, chose three winners of a contest to find people who have never experienced snow.

The three winners, from Atlanta, Australia and Hawaii, will become social media maniacs for the tourism office. They will post on a blog, snowatfirstsight.com, and contribute updates to social media mainstays like Facebook, Flickr, Twitter and YouTube.

The Colorado contest parallels one by Queensland that sought someone for the so-called “best job in the world,” acting for a year as a caretaker of an island.

The three winners will stay in Colorado through March, visiting cities and resorts like Copper Mountain, Crested Butte, Denver, Snowmass, Steamboat and Vail.

The agency for the Colorado contest is MMG Mardiks, part of MMG Worldwide.

And several marketers have hired an agency called GeniusRocket, which offers an online marketplace for crowdsourced campaigns. Would-be ad creators submit work based on what each marketer is seeking; there are usually cash prizes for the winning entry.

One marketer is Kayem Foods, asking for a video clip for its Al Fresco brand of chicken sausage that could be distributed on a “viral” basis. There are submissions from three finalists for the Al Fresco project.