38minuters scoop half of VodafoneLiveGuy's free laptops

[Ewan McIntosh]

It's been a heck of a day - no lunch, non-stop meetings, the general lack of sunlight in my outdoor moments. However, it was nice to kick back at C4 Glasgow Towers (above) for 15 minutes with VodaphoneLiveGuy (I know his name but would be shot if I told you), the star of the mobile giant's latest geolocation-Twitter-Facebook-blog extravanganza.

Equipped with a nifty mobile app and some GPS stuff from digital agency Dare, LiveGuy is tracing his way across the country with a pile of Dell Netbooks to give away to those who can find him on the site's Google Map or from clues dropped into Twitter and the blog. With some entertaining YouTube videos featuring the likes of Lewis Hamilton they've kicked off a storm, being mobbed by enthusiastic and presumably computerless Scots.


Yesterday 38minutes regular Mike Coulter caught up with him in Edinburgh Coffee Morning's bastion Centotre, with 38minute affiliate marketer Fraser Edwards picking up his netbook shortly afterwards. Meanwhile in Glasgow today fellow 38mins mucker Tony Black managed to pocket one of the nifty pieces of kit on offer, along with a Twitter acquaintance Weblivz.

So, we have plenty of excitement, lots of people turning up at the secret locations around the UK's cities, with more to come over the next few weeks: Newcastle tomorrow, followed by Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham, London and more. But, how many netbooks can 38minutes and WhoNeedsTheSea participants nab?

Do campaigns like this only work with an echo chamber of the converted? Do Vodaphone need to care or do blog posts like this equate to the sums they would have paid for in equivalent, if slightly more boring, publicity in more traditional arenas?

[Anny Deery]

Well done Tony!

I too was chasing down the Vodafone Live Guy. Only snag was that due to appointments in Glasgow on Monday then Edinburgh on Tuesday me and the liveguy were only in the same city for a matter of hours. Still, I tried to track him down with the help of some office based friends as like Tony my near constant data use when I'm out and about has a serious drain on battery as mine nearly ran out too. Thanks for the heads up from the girls at Shiny Shiny.

I definitely reckon its a great promo from Vodafone, why haven't one of the manufacturers, like Nokia with all their GPS functionality and their new push on nokia maps recently done something similar? To think that the GPS enabled Nokia N95 is over 18 months old but. Maybe its not too late for a link up with Joiku-spot software that enables your wi-fi enabled device to become a peer-to-peer internet connection.

[Tony Black]

Yes agreed with all above.

Great to be part of a real life demo of a mobile, gps, web 2.0 mashable competition. We've been discussing similar ideas for Radio Magnetic promo and although I won as well (Ruth's gonna love this for Chrimnbo, Sshhh!) it was brilliant researching how this idea actually works for participants.

Must admit I was really excited and felt like a true 2.0 master checking the blog and googling the clues to chase down the live guy. My phone actually ran out of battery before I found him so almost lost out.

Lesson to be learned... Always charge your mobile over night and get a data allowance package. You never know when you might need to google something on the move.

If anyone wants to come up with similar campaign I'd love to get involved as I've got loads of ideas from completing this one and think it's a brilliant promo tool. Let's see how big the snowball gets!

[Fraser Edwards]

Being a winner might cloud my judgement but I think it's been a great idea. Especially to combine the demonstration of the product capabilities with a competition that gets people talking. I agree with Mike that momentum will build and liveguy is probably going to have to be a bit more cryptic in London instead of just giving out a GPS position.

As Stuart said it's got me talking about Vodafone when I never would have mentioned to a friend before and instead I'm nudging people I know in each city to get out there and looking.

In terms of costs it seems they are giving away 44 netbooks (normally free on £25/month tarrif) so that's a ball park of £13k worth of kit at retail prices plus two guys to travel the country for two weeks plus other costs. I think in the end they'll definitely be getting better value out of it than something like a newspaper ad.

It's interesting too that I've seen most activity on twitter - not on facebook or blog comments etc although they have tried to draw those elements in too.

[Steven Livingstone]

I had a great time. Sure, i won, but whilst doing it i had loads of ideas how it may evolve.

My day is blogged here :

http://tinyurl.com/6rwgh9

[Stuart Cosgrove]

Good to see the vofafone guy in the flesh. I didn't have the heart to tell him about Lobby Lud a preGPS innovator. Power is in the fact that we are exchanging dialogue about a mobile phone company and acting as 'reluctant' brand amabassadors.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lobby_Lud

[Stuart Cosgrove]

Good to see the vofafone guy in the flesh. I didn't have the heart to tell him about Lobby Lud a preGPS innovator.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lobby_Lud

[Michael Coulter]

Ewan, my guess is that the importance of input from 'civilians' in campaigns like this will only grow. Google; 'vodafoneliveguy', and amongst the expected seo'd SERP's there are one or two good 'social' returns on P1. My guess is that as the project snowballs south there will be more social stuff showing up on GP1. (google page 1 rather than any subtle reference to Lewis Hamilton who for readers who don't know, appears in some of the vflg promo stuff.)