On Friday we launched P&G’s second big campaign for the Febreze Pet Odor Eliminator which got written up in Brandweek. The campaign is likely the farthest reaching social media campaign we’ve put together and I expect will be our most successful advertiser brand campaign yet. But, I’m even happier to see the Febreze’s team get the respect they are due for committing to advertising in social media the right way.

Anyone that produces a modern website considers the benefits of socially-focused advertising as obvious as XHTML, but for Madison Avenue it’s still an opportunity to get fired. (Remember the Chevy Tahoe video campaign?) And even for those deeply immersed in social networking it’s still very easy to bungle social advertising (remember Facebook’s Beacon?) So, after a successful product launch with us in April where 20,000 pet owners joined Febreze’s Dogster/Catster Groups, Febreze wanted to take it to the next level and it was critical to all parties to get it right.

Here’s what we orchestrated and why BrandWeek covered the campaign:

*) Febreze understands how important pet adoption and rescue is to our community, so they are now the sponsor of the popular Dogster.com Adoption Center

*) Continuing their commitment to adoption and rescue, Febreze is giving away thousands of gift packs to owners of adopted dogs and cats. Anyone who has adopted a pet is eligible!

*) Raising puppies and kittens right is also very important so they are the sponsors of the Dogster Puppy Answers and Catster Kitten Answer areas.

*) People want to have fun too. Febreze is sponsoring a free gift (seen to the right) in our virtual store. In the first 5 days over 100,000 member pages (~16% of all profiles!) have received one of the gift collars.

On top of this the Febreze Pet Odor Eliminator message will be strategically messaged on our homepage and in our newsletters. Meanwhile campaign banners will be run-of-site through the entire campaign

What’s also gratifying is that by getting this right, we’ve collectively created new engagements factor for members. They love giving the gifts and getting the gifts. They’ve devised games based around the gifts and are writing about it in their diaries and forums. Here’s a member doggie’s photo I stumbled upon over the weekend.

So kudos to Febreze and their ad team for putting in the development time and prep work to turn what could have been a same-old banner campaign into a top topic of conversation on our sites and a source of a lot of fun and engagement.