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On Nov. 3, Microsoft took over Times Square with a 600-person choreographed dance party to celebrate the launch of Dance Central (MTV Games/Harmonix), one of the games that can be played on the company’s newest controller-free Kinect for Xbox 360, which hit retailers the next day. The stunt was part of a series of all-day publicity events in New York City, including three gaming pods called the Mobile Playspaces where consumers could demo the product.

Concur, a provider of employee expense management services, in October began a five-week, $61,354.03 spending spree to promote the Concur Breeze, a web-based and mobile expense reporting system for small- to medium-sized businesses. Called the $61,354.03 Expense Tracking, Not Stacking Tour, the effort dispersed three teams of leather-jacket clad “Breezers” on Harley-Davidson motorcycles who treated small business owners and employees to printing supplies or coffee breaks, and even picked up the occasional happy hour tab.

Through Dec. 4, college sports network ESPNU is taking its newly-updated ESPNU College GameDay Tour to 14 regular season games at campuses across the country including the University of Alabama, Auburn University, Boise State University and University of Oregon. The program is designed to raise awareness and drive viewer loyalty by demonstrating that the brand is as big a fan of college football as the students are. The program coincides with the expansion of game coverage from two to three hours each Saturday, when the games are broadcast live.


In our Then and Now series, EM revisits previous event marketing trends to find out where they’ve gone since we first reported on them. Are they old hats and has-beens? Or is that past up-and-comer a future best practice that’s now an industry standard? In this double-stuffed installment, we re-examine event registration systems, which we reported on in February 2007.

On Nov. 3, Microsoft took over Times Square with a 600-person choreographed dance party to celebrate the launch of Dance Central (MTV Games/Harmonix), one of the games that can be played on the company’s newest controller-free Kinect for Xbox 360, which hit retailers the next day. The stunt was part of a series of all-day publicity events in New York City, including three gaming pods called the Mobile Playspaces where consumers could demo the product.