Valentine's Day has now come and gone and I haven't had the chance to write a post about the holiday this year until now. It appears that marketers are the ones that are in love with the holiday more than any of us. This year especially I received more emails and saw more ads focused on what I should be doing that day with the person I love and what I should buy this person. It's gotten a little out of control, don't you think? However, it is a good excuse to remind someone that you love them.
Here's a very cute promotion that got my attention which involves some of the loves of my life, pets! Sure Fit, a provider of slipcovers and home and pet solutions, launched a Valentine’s Day Pet Kissing Photo Contest! They apparently have had past successes with their Halloween Pet Costume Contest and Holiday Pet Photo Contest, so they came up with a way to celebrate Valentine's Day.
Sure Fit ran the contest on their Facebook page and invited fans to submit a photo entry of themselves with their beloved pet sharing a smooch for a chance to win items from the Sure Fit Pet Collection. Three prize packages were awarded that consisted of Sure Fit products both humans and pets love!
Approved submissions were posted in the Sure Fit contest photo album on the Sure Fit Facebook page. Facebook fans were invited to vote for their favorite entries by “liking” the photos. The photo with the most “likes” won the contest which was announced on Valentine’s Day. And the winners are:
1st Place - Fritzi the Jack Russell!!
2nd Place - Balim Receiving His Special Valentine Kiss
3rd Place - Chesapeake, our Retriever
Now even though I do really like this contest, I have to comment on the fact that Sure Fit really was not in compliance with Facebook's Promotional Guidelines since they used the "like" button as their voting method. So don't go copying how they executed this contest. Sure Fit should be utilizing a application to post the photos in a gallery and then invite people to vote on them. So I think I'll reach out to the folks at Sure Fit and suggest ways to run this contest in the future that are in line with Facebook's guidelines.
Also, I have a couple of antique wing chairs that could really use some new skins. My cats have been using the chairs as their scratching post for way too long! So I now have become a fan of Sure Fit Slipcovers.
I am honored to have been asked by the folks at PMA to moderate a panel at this year's conference which is called 

Papa John's, the Official Pizza of the NFL, decided not to run an ad during the game last year, but instead launched a huge promotion. They offered a free, large, three-topping pizza to all of its online rewards program members if the game went into overtime as well as a $45 Papa John’s gift card every 45 seconds to randomly selected consumers who ordered its pizzas online during game day.
The 5 finalists will all receive $25,000 each and a trip to Indianapolis for a private Super Bowl XLVI party hosted by Doritos. Following the voting round, the two finalists with the most votes will be declared the Grand Prize winners and their spots will be aired during the Super Bowl XLVI broadcast. If either of these commercials is awarded one of the top 3 spots (including ties) according to the USA TODAY Ad Meter rankings, that Grand Prize Winner will receive a bonus of $1,000,000 for the #1 spot, $600,000 for the #2 spot OR $400,000 for the #3 spot. In addition, the Grand Prize winners will be offered a consulting contract with The Lonely Island, a comedic trio consisting of Akiva Schaffer, Jorma Taccone, and Andy Samberg, best known for a series of "digital shorts" aired on Saturday Night Live.
Rail Europe USA is the leading authority of European rail in the United States, representing more than 35 European railroads. They currently assist more than one million visitors each year experience Europe by train. Therefore, the grand prize that is offered for each contest round is a 3-country Eurail Select Pass. Winners have up to six months to claim their pass which can then be used over a two month period.
As of yesterday, their metrics suggested that Ron Paul held the highest overall "Viral Reach" with 59,554 comments this past week. Rick Perry had the most engaging single-post among candidates, followed by Jon Huntsman and Newt Gingrich. So Mitt Romney wasn't even mentioned and he just won the Iowa Caucuses by 8 votes!









