Honda’s Fit Leverages Web

LOS ANGELES Interactive media play a major role in RPA’s upcoming work in the ongoing Honda Fit launch, which sources have estimated at $50 million.

[Adweek Online first broke the news of the campaign on April 5.]

The Onion.com will feature click-through icons of various characters from the campaign, which also has a presence in 5- and 10-second traditional TV commercials, “mobisodes” and podcasts.

Consumers clicking on the images will be taken to microsites with detailed back-stories on characters including Speedy Demon, Silver Bullet, Nocturnal Flyer (a bat) and Frisky Predator (a cat). Copy takes the form of personal ads, said Lauren Mehl, media supervisor at RPA in Santa Monica, Calif.

“Our interactive programs on the Web are a way to feature the commercials, especially the 5- and 15-second spots,” said Meridee Alter, RPA svp and media director.

Following a Yahoo home page takeover on April 20 and 21 as Fit launched, Torrance, Calif.-based American Honda Motors will also be the first to brand a “widget” (downloadable desktop programs) offered by Yahoo.

Fit will sponsor the top 10 music videos for the next few months. “When you click below the widget, it expands and gives you four pictures that rotate, all linking to Honda,” said Alter. “It’s the first ad-supported widget they’ve done.”

Other programs include Honda’s sponsoring of Pandora, a music site that allows users to create a radio station for Web casting, and “Cube Fabulous,” a short-form episodic series about office cubicle makeovers that debuts May 15 on 450 sites on the Broadband Enterprises network.

Honda’s Fit is sponsoring the distribution of the show, and will sponsor “Cube Fabulous” on iFilm and Windows Media portals, among others.

“We’re not really controlling the content of the show in any way,” said Alter, “but we are working with them on fitting Fit into an episode.” The date or nature of the execution is undisclosed.