Few companies have ingrained the concept of co-creation into their corporate philosophy so seamlessly as Virgin.  Be it their record store, cell phone, airline or train division, Virgin Group comes up with some of the most interesting ways at getting their customers to interact with the brand.  Just a few of my (recent) favorite examples:

Virgin Train:

Most Americans have never been on a train, but over in England Virgin has started a line of transportation that takes rail to the next level.  They claim uber efficiency, plush accommodations, and affordability.  When they first launched their campaign to get people onboard they directly attacked their competition: airlines.

The campaign is called Plane Relief Plus: Targeted Relief for Air Travelers and the Environment.  Virgin courageously entered the rail space by hitting the planes with a one-two punch.  First, trade in your last plane ticket stub - say from London to Manchester - for a free first class ticket onboard Virgin Trains.  See the difference for yourself.  Second, consider the environmental impact of your plane flight…ride that green bandwagon, baby.

The campaign is working swimmingly.  Easyjet got so pissed at Virgin’s approach that they went to the Advertising Standards Authority.  Their case against Virgin was roundly rejected, thus fueling - pardon the pun - Virgin’s mission to get people off planes and back onto the ground.

From the Professional Pilot’s Rumour Network:

During the past year, Virgin Trains’ Moving Annual Average punctuality for trains between Glasgow and London arriving within 15 minutes of scheduled time rose from 80.3 to 85.3 percent, while Easyjet’s average punctuality between Glasgow and Luton fell from 86.7 to 73.1 percent. The airline suffered a 9.4 percent reduction in passengers on the route during this period, and its average punctuality between Glasgow and Stansted also fell, from 86.2 to 71.6 percent. At the same time Virgin has seen a 25 percent growth on their London to Glasgow route.

Branson has a tight business model, a powerful positioning statement, and great advertising and PR.  Damn, he’s good.

Virgin Mobile America:

Meanwhile, across the pond Virgin is dabbling with a new media channel that bedevils the lot of us: mobile advertising.  It is still such a wolf in sheep’s clothing, isn’t it?  Mobile advertising?  Who would think of using it?

Well, Virgin has figured out that the best way to present the concept of mobile advertising to the public is to have them opt in for the service.  Taking a bold step ahead of all their competitors, they have started a new campaign called Sugar Mama.

The results are in.  The Future of Media, Interpublic’s whiz bang interactive think tank, just reported that Virgin Mobile is winning the hearts of their customers by offering opt-in mobile advertising.  From their blog post:

Just last week…Virgin reported that it signed up roughly 330,000 of its 4.8 million U.S. subscribers for its Sugar Mama program, which “pays” them one minute of free call time for every 45 seconds they spend interacting with an ad on their phones or the company’s Web site.  Since the program was launched about a year ago, Virgin has given away upwards of 9 million mobile airtime minutes.

…Virgin’s data shows some success in getting this audience (25-34) to actually respond to what’s being advertised:  On average, Sugar Mama participants clicked on offers in the ads they viewed more than 5% of the time—which is, of course, significantly higher than the average response rate to most online ads of under 1%.
 

This is really amazing news.  While everybody else is sitting around trying to figure out the secret to mobile marketing, Virgin has already dabbled and found measurable success.  My prediction is that Virgin will be the first company to install barcode readers into their cell phones.  Pretty soon, Boston will look like this street in Japan:

Opt-in mobile advertising isn’t co-creation in the traditional sense, but it is bringing in the customer into the decision-making process.  The customer does have control and can “create” time for advertising while receiving minutes in return.  Give and take, take and give.