Have You Mentioned Skittles Enough Lately?

Skittles is running a crazy marketing campaign right now, and it involves Twitter. Do click the Skittles link, and you won’t be led to a regular candy-colored website (although you’ll get a few candy-colored floating objects). Instead, you’ll see a Twitter search results page on just about any post that mentions Skittles, refreshing every few seconds.

Your Twitter profile can get its 15 seconds of fame if you mention Skittles now. Oh, did I mention you have to put in the keyword Skittles in the body of your tweet?

Twitter seems to be abuzz with Skittles talk right now. But is there any sense to their newfound popularity among the social media crowd? The mere mention of a keyword–not to mention a brand–might be enough to dilute the brand, particularly if it becomes overused. On the other hand, having it mentioned in a lot of places by a lot of people would surely be a big boost to popularity.

And now here I am finding myself craving for something sweet (and possibly a bit sour and colorful, too). Sadly, I couldn’t find a pack of Skittles inside my cupboard, or anywhere around the house, for that matter. I settle for some other piece of candy.

If you can get the attention of the likes of @Scobleizer and @ChrisGarrett to Tweet about you, then I would agree this is one way to go if you want your brand to stick in people’s minds–or between their teeth, or the roofs of their mouths.

People will *definitely* be linking to #skittles I guarantee it – absolutely works as media bait AND link bait, wait and see 🙂 – @ChrisGarrett

But more importantly, if your Tweetbait is strong enough to lead the likes of myself to grab on to the nearest candy bar, mint or gumdrop, then you may have just artificially propped up demand, not just for Skittles, but for all things sweet, sour, or candylicious.

That probably beats any economic stimulus package. It’s inexpensive. It’s worldwide. And it’s sweet.