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.

Welp, Palm’s Pre is sure trying to. For their word-of-mouth campaign they are trying to recruit Howard Stern. He has been very vocal about the fact that he is in the market for a new phone. He has been very loyal to his Treo but realizes that he’s starting to look a little behind the times.

He has already decided against the iPhone because of the lack of keyboard. So Pre had the perfect opportunity to get Stern’s attention.

Palm is being very ballsy with the public test of the Pre. They’ve chosen one of the biggest mouths ever in Howard Stern, so this could really make or break the Pre. Since Stern has so much more access to the Pre than the press, even more of the Pre’s success hinges on Stern’s evaluation.

“They’re going to show me the Pre and then take it away. They’re trying to build excitement for this thing. If people don’t buy this, I don’t see how Palm keeps going,” said Stern.

So far, the Pre is doing pretty well when compared to the pre-launch of the iPhone. The week of the Pre announcement there were a little under 400,000 visits to Palm.com and Sprint.com, which is good compared to the 600,000 visits to Macworld the week the iPhone launched. The Pre’s numbers are actually really surprising considering their far smaller marketing budget and the amount of media coverage that surrounded the iPhone’s launch.