Vitaminwater’s new flavour created with Facebook app

“Sorry to pull you away from checking out your ex’s photo gallery, but Vitaminwater needs your help.” Offering an alternative use for Facebook, the beverage company is inviting users to create new flavours and vitamin content. After adding the FlavorCreator app from Vitaminwater’s Facebook page, users can help influence the flavour, functional benefits and design of the new water. First, they are invited to choose their favourite of ten flavours, picked from the ten most mentioned flavours elsewhere on the web according to the app’s ‘buzz meter’. (Which means the crowds are indirectly and unwittingly contributing, too.) The second step lets users play games and answer quiz questions, helping Vitaminwater understand the most desired nutritional benefits, and which functional ingredients to add to the drinks. The last step lets users name the flavour, and decide the aesthetic and copy to be used on the bottle. Rapper 50 Cent and American Idol winner Carrie Underwood will help decide the winning submission, which comes complete with a USD 5,000 prize. The winner will be announced in December, with the flavour available from March 2010. Product development contests aren’t new, of course. But Vitaminwater stresses that this isn’t just another marketing program: like Coca-Cola’s new Freestyle machine, the app enables the company to get feedback on the tastes du jour, producing products that are more likely to become best-sellers. R&D, product promotion and branding building: not a bad result from customers frittering away time on their lunch breaks 😉 Spotted by: Judy McRae