G-Star is entering into social media territory in their New York Fashion Week Competition

In a previous post I wrote about how crowd sourcing seems to be gaining popularity in advertising, but in this online competition by G-Star the crowd sourcing idea has had a social media layer added to it. People are simply encouraged to sign up for the competition by using the log in from their favorite social networking site. Then it's up to the individual Facebook, Twitter, Youtube or Flicr user to impress the G-Star judges by uploading video, images and writing tweets showcasing their passion for fashion and denim. The most convincing social networking effort in each category is rewarded with a trip to New York Fashion Week where they get to cover the G-Star runway show, and get their reports streamed live on G-Star.com.

The aim is of course to get people to participate and engage with the brand in a more active fashion. But the way the competition is set up also allows G-Star to get a valuable presence in people's social networks and online conversations. Definitely a good attempt at integrating social media and advertising. It will be interesting to see what the development will be like in this area in 2010.

Spotted at Viralblog