This is a fantastic article from Mashable today….

As we all know, social media marketing attempts to create a conversation and engage its audience with something more than just a product. It’s the notion of a lifestyle, and what it means to buy a product and then engage with its makers. 

The public, having grown wary of traditional advertising, has become more difficult to convince. That’s where the brand ambassador — the person who creates a sense of credibility, likability or interest — comes in. And while “real people” acting as the face of a huge brand is nothing new, the age of social media has made a compelling case for marketers to choose this route over traditional advertising. 

Here are five successful ambassador campaigns from the last 15 years that have made a big impact on their respective brands, as well as the marketing landscape. They serve to illustrate how in today’s social media world, conversations with passionate people are an excellent (an often more successful) way to sell a product. 

1. Wendy Kaufman, The Snapple Lady

Wendy Kaufman began working for Snapple back in 1991 and became a brand ambassador by chance. Kaufman had been answering the company’s fan mail in her free time, since no one else in the office wanted to do it, and she recognized that there were many people trying to connect with the tea and juice maker. When Snapple’s new ad agency heard of her good-natured gesture, it developed a campaign around her — launching Kaufman into the spotlight as one of the first everyday people to advocate for a consumer brand. Before the web was mainstream, and long before social media as we know it today, the campaign was a fresh and creative way for the company to connect with fans. 

The ads, featuring Kaufman reading and answering fan mail, were a success and were in part responsible for launching Snapple as a household name and boosting sales from $23 million to $750 million a year in 1995. While Snapple inevitably let her go in 1994, Kaufman returned as a spokesperson for the brand in 1997 after the company was bought by Quaker Oats. 

Today, fans can turn to the web and meet Dave on the Best Stuff Web Show, who asks random people about what they think is the best stuff on earth, offering challenges and answering tweets from the company’s Twitter feed. 

2. Jared Fogel, The Subway Guy

Jared Fogel became a brand ambassador for Subway in 1999 after word of his amazing 245-pound weight loss, attributed to eating almost nothing but Subway sandwiches, hit the news. In 2000, Fogel and his weight loss success were introduced to the world in a commercial for “The Subway Diet.” It was a campaign that was a huge hit for both Subway and Fogel, who starred in more than 50 TV commercials and made in-store appearances across the U.S. 

Since launching Fogel’s campaign, Subway’s sales more than doubled to $8.2 billion. In 2008, the company celebrated Fogel’s maintained weight loss for a full decade by retiring his 62-inch pants, a staple of the commercials. 

After Fogel took a break from Subway in 2005, the company saw a 10% drop in sales, and felt the need to bring him back — proof of how important spokespeople can be to a brand. 

Today, Jared is still a Subway spokesperson, and is working with the company in new, digital ways to reach out to consumers — with Jared’s Journey, an interactive and informative guide, complete with a timeline() as to how Jared has kept the extra pounds off. While the Subway Guy isn’t as prominent in commercials, he is still a staple of Subway’s website — asking fans to make a promise, like the one he made back in 1998, to start living healthier.
 

3. Tony Martin, Kelly Ferris and Antonio Santiago – Coca-Cola

 
Coca-Cola Expedition 206 – Project Introduction Video from Expedition 206 on Vimeo.

Last year Coca-Cola plucked three people out of obscurity to travel the globe, visiting 206 countries (every place Coke is sold), making videos, taking pictures, tweeting, blogging, Facebooking, and interacting with all the world’s Coke-loving fans. 

Team “The MIX” — Tony Martin, Kelly Ferris and Antonio Santiago — were named the winners via online votes from fans all over the world. All regular, everyday people with very different backgrounds — Martin, a kindergarten teacher from D.C., Ferris, a South African-born university student from Brussels, and Santiago, a university student from Mexico City — have spent the past year visiting more countries than most see in a lifetime and spreading a message of “Open Happiness.” 

Since the team was chosen by consumers, their fans are more invested in their activities. Since January 1, the team has been making its own way (save for airfare) across the planet on Expedition 206. It’s their job to get their own food, find places to stay, and meet people along the way. While the team has been given a per diem for food/travel expenses, it’s up to them and the people at home interacting with them to decide what they do with it. 

In the past year the team has made stops to visit the FIFA World Cup in South Africa, the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, and the World Expo in Shanghai. Currently, the trio are visiting Angola, with the Maldives next on the list, and will finish in the U.S. on December 31. 

Throughout the entire trip, fans have been invited to interact with the team, offering or recommending places to stay, not-to-miss attractions, amazing places to eat, and more. The whole concept is pretty creative, inviting consumers not just to think about the product but the message of unity that Coca-Cola can bring to the world. That’s a difficult message to convey with traditional advertising. 

4. Microsoft MVPs

Mircosoft MVPs are brand ambassadors, but on a smaller scale. It’s a brand ambassador program designed for sharing expertise with others. The program was originally launched within Mircosoft’s support teams as a way to recognize, reward and support users who had been the most active on Usenet forums in helping others solve their tech issues. Over the years, the MVP program has grown into a brand of its own. 

As the site says: “With the MVP Award, we thank these inspiring individuals for representing the voice of thousands in the community through the powerful and independent feedback they give us, and for helping our customers maximize the potential of their software. MVPs are passionate about improving technology. From beta testing to helping Microsoft identify real-world customer needs, MVPs offer amazing contributions with great dedication. And they answer millions of questions each year from technology users around the world.” 

MVPs have to earn the titular honor each year. In turn, they get to display the program’s logo on their resumes, business cards, blogs and social networking profiles. Each year, thousands make the journey to the Microsoft’s HQ in Washington for a week-long summit and celebration with the company’s execs and product teams. 

A program like this serves to recognize its most engaged consumers, giving them a title that both reflects well on them and the company. It fosters a sense of community and competition that keeps people interested and distinguishes them from other brands. 

To keep track of the MVP community, there is an MVP blog, along with Twitter(), Facebook() and YouTube() accounts. 

5. Walmart’s Moms

 

Moms in search of deals are some of Walmart’s best customers, so it’s fitting that moms have become ambassadors for the retail giant, and offer “money-saving tips, budget advice, product reviews and insight on how to save money and live better.” 

It’s a simple concept: “Mom” shops at Walmart the most, so she probably has a few tricks up her sleeve. Walmart has created an online community made up of moms who share their thoughts on forums about parenting, healthy living, the environment and politics. It features 20 mom bloggers who specialize in different areas that interest their consumer demographic, like Christine Young’s From Dates to Diapers, and Melissa Garcia’s Consumer Queen. 

Walmart has created a group of brand ambassadors who are accessible to consumers, yet they aren’t seen as spokespeople. It’s important that the moms are viewed as regular people who are available to offer some helpful advice. 

Like any large corporation, Walmart channels its social media presence through the usual platforms. But its
Walmart Community Action Network on YouTube is fairly unique in the amount of consumers they talk to. The ways in which everyday consumers shop at and experience Walmart is the best promotion they can get.

For the original published article on Mashable click here.