This information is 100% stolen from trendwatching.com

Here are some conversations that have been collected from twitter where big brands are monitoring the conversation and responding in real time to customer service issues.

Five years ago if your company had world class customer service that meant you had some good information on your website and customers could call your toll free number 24/7

Today? you can no longer afford to wait for customers to bring their complaints to you.  If you are waiting to solve problems you are losing customers. You must be proactive about listening to the conversations and responding in real time. Twitter is an amazing tool for this. Here are some awesome examples from big brands.

Let me just qualify that and say I am throwing in the big brands thing to show that this behavior is now mainstream not that you need a big budget.  We have clients doing this way better than the big boys with micro brands and micro budgets.  check out zarbees on twitter.

Chances are your company or cause is much smaller than these. Can you really afford not to be part of the conversation?

Creativity Online recently featured Nomis for their unique approach to promoting their soccer cleats. The market has already been inundated with big brands like Nike, Reebok, Adidas, Puma, etc., so Nomis had to find a way to differentiate themselves.

Their approach is all about demo. Nomis came up with Vanguards, which essentially are portable stores. They show up at soccer practices and let players try the shoes for themselves. The vans are driven by ex-players and coaches. Then “players use their body as the ultimate testing tool” to find the right shoe for them.

While their Vanguard idea is great, Nomis really differentiating themselves by treating their customers how the “other brands only treat their stars.” Each player can have personal time with professionals and find their perfect shoe. And now they have some online buzz to accompany their offline conversations.

Check it out.

It seems like we’ve been talking a lot about how car companies are promoting their new cars. It’s interesting to see how each company uniquely used social media in their ad campaigns.

Ford is doing their 6-month test-drive and asking their drivers to talk about their experiences on social networks. Honda created a blog for the new Insight in order to get consumer insights and share information. Now BMW has created a new integrated marketing campaign to promote the 2010 BMW Z4 Roadster that relies on both online and offline outlets.

The new ad campaign is called “Expression of Joy.” The campaign features a painting the size of 2 football fields created by artist Robin Rhode and filmmaker Jake Scott. The advertisements were filmed by Scott as Rhode drove two Z4s with paint jets mounted behind the wheels. Every angle and movement of the Z4 was captured by 45 cameras and used 160 liters of paint.

The 30-second spots from the footage captured by Scott can be seen on TV and online. There was a 30-minute doumentary about the creation of the ad was shown on Discovery HD Theater on May 10. BMW is the first to use MSN.com’s expandable video unit, which allows viewers to see the advertisements in full-screen mode. There will also be video banner ads on CNN, Yahoo, and other top websites. They’ve also made their own website for the new Z4 at  expressionofjoy.com.

“Expression of Joy” will also be seen in print, including an 8-page insert in Vanity Fair’s June issue, and outdoor advertisements.

“BMW Z4 – An Expression of Joy” is a game that has been developed for the iPhone and iPod Touch and has been available to download since May 10.

BMW has done a realy great job making not only making cool, chic advertisements – very BMW – but also developing a great integrated marketing campaign. I love that they made a game for the iPhone. It’s the perfect place to reach their market and there’s a good chance that everyone who downloads it will be totally addicted, like most other iPhone games.

While there are some great online aspects to the campaign, it would have been even better if they were utilizing social networks. It would have been so simple to integrate Twitter or Facebook into their campaign. This would have given them way more exposure. Maybe next time.

The ESPN-Youtube channel is now up and running. Not many people know about it, though. Probably because neither ESPN nor Youtube is promoting it yet.

There are high hopes for the new channel; the biggest sports network paired with the biggest online video sharing site. How could it go wrong? I’m just hoping they’ll start talking about it offline soon in order to get the huge audience they’re expecting.

Right now, the content is what you would expect. Just clips from Sports Center. Don’t get me wrong, that’s great stuff but ESPN has a great opportunity to target their superfan in more meaningful ways than with just sports clips they could see anyday on ESPN.

Everyone loves the Sports Center commentators and the funny commercials, which everyone talks about for years. They should use Youtube to give their fans exclusive access to ESPN commercials and behind-the-scenes footage of the sports casters.

If they are trying to get the attention of legit ESPN superfans, give them something unique and funny. Feed their appetite for signature ESPN humor.

Crispin Porter & Bogusky has done it again. I love these guys. They are always pushing the envelope in incredibly creative and unique ways. This time, however, their humor and creativity has caught the attention of the Mexican government.

Getting in trouble is nothing new for CP+B. Just a few months ago they were asked by Facebook to take down their “Whopper Sacrifice” application because it violated privacy policy. Most recently advocacy groups got in a huff about the “Spongebob” BK commercial. And then there was the “Whopper Virgins” campaign last December that was not very well received, but totally funny.

So what’s different this time? CP+B is actually altering their advertisement to comply with complaints, which will be the first time they are willingly making requested changes (Facebook forced them to shut down “Whopper Sacrifice”). But I guess when you degrade citizens and disprespect the national flag of a country, that just happens to be the second largest market besides the United States, something’s gotta give.

When I watched the commercial the first time, I didn’t see why anyone would find it offensive. I thought it was totally funny. Meaning that I am an insensitive jerk or I’m not Mexican – I’ll let you decide.  It reminded me of Nacho Libre and BrokeBack Mountain, which made me giggle. I thought the concept was clever and the copy was just cheesy enough. Who could be upset by that? Turns out a whole country.

Ambassador Jorge Zermeno wrote that the “advertisement denigrates the image of our country and uses improperly Mexico’s national flag.” He noted that Mexico has strict laws barring the defamation of the flag.

It wasn’t until I read this blog comment that I realized how serious this really was to people:

“And there’s something far worse, at least to anyone born and raised in Mexico, taught from a wee age that though there are few things genuinely sacred in life, one of those things is unquestionably the national flag. For better or worse, Mexicans have a thing about flags, and so…(here’s the part you gotta pay close attention to): In Mexico this “inoffensive” advert with the cute little wrestler and Texas cowboy would be in flagrant violation of federal law.”

In this case, it’s probably a good call that CP+B is changing their advertising in order to prevent any further offense. I’m thinking that this might also be the first time that CP+B wasn’t intentionally controversial. They’ve done some pretty crazy things in the past and not been bothered by negative feedback. I’m always impressed with how CP+B takes risks in their advertising despite criticism but I’m also impressed that they are willing to correct this mistake.

PC and Mac have been going back and forth for a while now with their advertising. Mac’s “Get a Mac” campaign has been running for a while now, which has been used to beat down the Microsoft name. Microsoft has been less consistent. They’ve had their “I’m a PC” campaign with random sprinkling of Jerry Seinfeld commercial, meant to reintroduce the brand.

Now Microsoft has unveiled their new campaign that is thought to rival Mac’s ad campaign. The premise of the “Laptop Hunter ” ads is to show people looking for laptops with certain specifications within a set budget. Microsoft offers to pay the price of the computer if they can find one within that range. This is definitely a departure from past Microsoft and Mac ads.

It’s obvious that Microsoft is taking into account the economic environment. They’re taking into account that people are more careful about how much they spend on new investments. Microsoft is showing consumers that they can buy a laptop that is personalized and unique for a reasonable price. Whereas Mac is still playing the cool card.

Apple unveiled a $2700 MacBook Pro at this year’s Macworld Expo. It might be time for Apple to shift their selling points to reflect what’s happening economically and socially. At the same time, they might be trying to maintain their status as the cooler, more expensive laptop. However, we’ve mentioned before that Apple is known for not listtening to their customers. Is this just another example of them ignoring what their customers in order to look cooler than PC?

Microsoft’s new campaign is definitely well-timed and it may prove beneficial for them to focus on price and value as opposed to the cool factor.

Ford is bravely entering the world of social media at full speed. To build buzz about their new compact car, the Fiesta, Ford is giving their branding and promotion responsibilities to 100 young web savvy people.

The best part of this plan is that none of these individuals has any advertising experience. They were chosen for their “social vibrancy” rating. Essentially, they were judged by their web presence and popularity – number of online followers and accounts on different social media platforms. They were also judged according to their creativity, film-making skills and ability to retain audience’ attention.

So here’s the deal, Ford is giving each of the 100 people chosen a Ford Fiesta to drive around for six months. They will be asked to document their experience with the car through Youtube videos, blog posts and other social media updates.

We always talk about the key to good and honest marketing is being transparent. Ford is taking this a step farther by not having any censorship over what is said and posted about the Fiesta. This is definitely a make-or-break situation for Ford. They must have thought of this, so Ford must be confident enough in their product to publicize this trial period. And if it goes horribly wrong, Ford still has about a year to redeem themselves before the Fiesta hits U.S. dealers.

Ford, we commend you for the unique grass roots campaign. It’s a great idea and will definitely build buzz and awareness about the Fiesta. For Ford’s sake, hopefully it’s positive buzz.

There are two things I love in this world: nontraditional advertising and musicals. I never imagined these two things could come together so flawlessly. I thought both of these videos were incredibly creative and effectively got people excited about the theater.

I’m really impressed with how lastminute.com went about creating buzz. It was a great way to create word-of-mouth marketing among people at the performances but it also created great videos to be spread virally.

My favorite part of The Sound of Music video is when the hard-core guy in all black is smiling and clapping at the end of the performance. Absolutely perfect.

I thought this was a cool marketing campaign. It’s for Golden Fire beer from about a year ago. It puts together guerrilla, viral, and web in a way that peaks interest. While I was watching the video I was wondering if the campaign was actually effective and what do you know? They put in all the stats for us. Whether or not this is marketing genius or not, I think we can all agree that repetitive cleavage will increase viewership.

Tropicana redesigned their packaging only to be attacked on social networks. Because of the fierce criticism, Tropicana quickly changed their packaging back to the original. At the time of the change back to the old packaging, Neil Campbell, president of Tropicana North America, said the change was a result of their loyal customers being turned off by the new look. So if that’s true, their loyal customers buy A LOT of orange juice. Tropicana’s sales a staggering 20% decrease in the weeks following the change. Call me crazy, but I think the internet mob had more to do with their decrease in sales than Tropicana is admitting to.

It’s surprising how attached people get to the packaging of their orange juice. Whether Tropicana admits it or not, they were smart to listen to the criticism of online commentators and go back to the original cartons. Had they ignored what was being said online, there could have been more detrimental results.

Here are just a few Tweets about Tropicana’s rebranding:

Tronnix: @aestus I saw the new carton in wallyworld and I thought is was generic OJ, It took me a few looks to realize it was Tropicana. Epic Failure

kmandeville: @myl I couldn’t agree more, re; Tropicana….I couldn’t believe the carton redesign! I couldn’t find it ANYWHERE at first. Crazy.

dancingmango: What was tropicana thinking of? Web 2.0 carton was never going to work http://bit.ly/I2lx (expand) …their sales plunge 20% post-rebranding

davidgfishman: Glad to hear that Tropicana is switching back to it’s old carton logo!

michaelfishman: Tropicana does about face on new carton design. I could not agree more, this looked like a discount generic

NicoleBlanchard: Another win for the consumer – Tropicana is bringing back the old carton packaging due to negative response….some through Twitter!

wulatino: Do you like the new Carton box of Tropicana Juice, I don’t know for some reason it look kind of Funny, I don’t even want to buy it.

tlw12884: wanted OJ this morning. got to the store and only saw tropicana in the new carton. i only like my OJ in the old carton. drinking apple juice

I don’t understand why Tropicana won’t say their recent changes were a result of online criticism. If anything, it shows that they are in tune with their consumers and are concerned about their opinions. It was a good move to change back to their original look but they should have been more honest about the impact online conversations had on their sales.