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"\"The web is what you make of it,\" reads the parting text in Google Chrome's latest commercial featuring Lady Gaga. \nIt's a simple eight-word slogan for Google's web browser but it represents so much more when you connect it to Gaga, who took to the web this year to create an inescapable marketing spectacle for her Born This Way album.\nIn the months leading up to the May 23 album release \u2014 and even now \u2014 Gaga has paved a path for stars and brands to get inventive with the ways they use digital and social media to promote themselves and connect with fans.\nThe 25-year-old is no stranger to success on the web. She remains a heavyweight on major social networks: In the past year, Lady Gaga was the first artist to reach 1 billion views on YouTube; she beat President Barack Obama to 10 million Facebook fans (she's now closing in on 35 million); and most recently, she was first Twitter user to acquire 10 million followers.\nThe promotional juggernaut further ramped up her all-encompassing web presence, fostering partnerships with Zynga for the FarmVille-inspired GagaVille, Starbucks for a massive scavenger hunt, VEVO for exclusive premieres, HBO for a concert special, Rdio for free lifetime subscriptions, iTunes for a promotional countdown, Best Buy and Livestream for an album signing and Gilt Groupe and Amazon Cloud Player for deals. \n\"Gaga and her team are some of the best marketers around; they understand the importance of integrating social with traditional media, engaging audiences in real-time, and most of all, telling a story that is relatable and worth spreading,\" said Alexa Scordato, a Gaga fan, digital strategist and community manager for MAT@USC. \nEven Lady Gaga's critics have to acknowledge the magnitude of her marketing medley: \"I'll probably get cyber bullied after this from all her Little Monsters, but I'm not a huge Gaga fan,\" said Romey Louangvilay, senior account executive of digital and social media at Euro RSCG PR. \"With that said, I give her credit for her artistry and marketing genuineness.\" \nBelow, we've compiled a huge swathe of the digital and social media initiatives behind Gaga's Born This Way. Flip through the roundup and then let us know in the comments which tactics you thought were most creative or most ridiculous. \n\n\nHow Lady Gaga Created a Web Marketing Spectacle for Born This Way\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nZynga's GagaVille\n\nOn May 17, Zynga launched the Farmville-style GagaVille, which garnered much ridicule from Gaga haters and laughs from even the most devoted Little Monsters.\nJokes aside, Lady Gaga like other big brands this year found a way to leverage the enormous social gaming population, which is expected to reach 68.7 million players by the end of 2012.\nGamers were able to unlock and stream unreleased tracks from Born This Way and bonus remixes. The game incorporated Gaga's style and personality with users having access to crystals, unicorns and sheep on motorcycles. The GagaVille campaign also incorporated Zynga game cards (buy a $25 card and receive the Born This Way album and bonus tracks for free); Words With Friends (use a Gaga word of the day and be entered for concert tickets); and RewardVille (win virtual goods to use in other Zynga games).\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nStarbucks Scavenger Hunt\n\nStarbucks and Mother Monster teamed up on May 19 for \u201CSRCH,\u201D a two-week digital scavenger hunt in which participants can scan in-store QR codes, visit blogs and Starbucks digital properties, decode cryptic messages and answer trivia questions to earn prizes.\nYahoo joined the fun on May 23, helping transform the Starbucks Digital Network into all things Gaga. Visitors to the site had access to a special edition of the Born This Way for one day. They also received a free \u201CEdge of Glory\u201D download and an exclusive video by Lady Gaga singing a cappella.\n\"Considering that Lady Gaga may be the world\u2019s hottest star right now and an innovative creator unlike anyone we\u2019ve seen, imagine our delight when we learned that she\u2019s also a big Starbucks fan,\" said Alexandra Wheeler, global digital strategy director for Starbucks, in a recent blog post.\nThe hunt ends June 7.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nGoogle Chrome Commercial\n\nIn the this commerical, Gaga is shown at a computer typing inspirational messages such as, \"This is our moment. ... Stay strong, Little Monsters!\"\nThe video highlights two things other than the capabilities of Google's web browser: The extent to which fans will broadcast their adoration for Gaga and also Gaga's willingness to return their positive sentiments.\nThe song for the video is \"Edge of Glory,\" a song from the new album.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nAmazon's $0.99 Sale\n\nGaga fans woke up May 23 to a nice surprise: Amazon was selling the 14-song album as a digital download for a mere $0.99. Fans also received 20 GB of Cloud Drive storage from Amazon.\nNews of the massive sale spread like wildfire and consumers quickly started experiencing technical difficulties. With servers overwhelmed, people who bought the digital download were unable to immediately access all tracks.\nIn time, all songs became available, but Amazon users had already unleashed their anger by leaving one-star ratings due to Amazon\u2019s slow service.\nTo get back on the good side of consumers, Amazon offered the deal again a few days later on May 26. In a tweet, @AmazonMP3 said, \u201CWe\u2019re doing it again and this time we\u2019re ready.\u201D\nAmazon has not disclosed the number of downloads for Born This Way.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nBest Buy Live Feed\n\nOn album launch day, Lady Gaga stayed up into the wee hours of the night to meet fans and sign autographs at a Best Buy in New York City. \nBest Buy promoted the event with a live video feed from Livestream. The video was surrounded by interactive features for fans who couldn't make it to the event. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nGoogle Interview\n\nIn March, Google executive Marissa Mayer interviewed Lady Gaga as part of the \u201CGoogle Goes Gaga\" event. She helped promote Google Moderator, a tool that allows fans to submit questions via text or video on the musician\u2019s YouTube channel and subsequently vote for their favorites.\nDuring the Q&amp;A, Gaga talked about her forthcoming album and revealed that she would make her directorial debut alongside choreographer Laurieann Gibson for her second single, \u201CJudas.\u201D\nThrough Google Moderator, her fans asked 643 questions about the single.\nNear the end, Gaga asked a rhetorical yet fitting question to the audience of Google employees and online viewers, \u201CDon\u2019t you love the Internet?\u201D\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nRobin Hood Charity\n\nIn April, Gaga once again dipped her feet into social good by working with the Robin Hood Foundation to launch two Facebook contests in support of the New York-based charity, which benefits the poor and homeless between the ages of 16 and 24.\nThe contest \u2014 to decide how Lady Gaga should split $1 million among five charities \u2014 ran from April 26 to May 6 and received 1,057,101 votes.&gt;  \nShe also lent her hand to the victims of the March 11 T\u014Dhoku earthquake and tsunami in Japan, providing an exclusive remix of her single \u201CBorn This Way\" for the Songs for Japan charity album.\nGaga also donated $1.5 million to Zynga\u2019s fundraising initiative with Save the Children and the American Red Cross via sales of her Japan Prayer Bracelets.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nGilt Groupe Deals\nGilt Groupe offered sales curated by Gaga's fashion director, Nicola Formichetti, as well as charity sales of a Mugler dress worn by Gaga, entrance into the Paris Mugler fashion show and access to a performance from Gaga. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nHBO Concert Special\n\nHBO aired Gaga's Monster Ball concert at New York City's Madison Square Garden on May 7.\nThe 120-minute concert special included the \"Born This Way\" single and teased the then-unreleased track \"Marry the Night.\"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nRdio Free Music\nRdio created a BTW playlist and a corresponding contest to give away a free music subscription.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nFacebook Engagement\n\nGaga ended 2010 as the celebrity with the most \"Likes\" on a Facebook Page with 24.7 million Likes.\nShe has one of the most active and engaged Facebook Pages not only because of her fans but also because she frequently shares status updates, photos, videos and news through the platform. On May 18, for example, she posted a photo collage that displays her album art on buildings, cars and even in and around a New York City subway train.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nVevo Exclusive Premieres \n\nVevo has so far exclusively premiered each of the official music videos for Born This Way.\nThe song \"Born This Way\" has racked up 52.7 million views on Vevo's website and \"Judas\" has accumulated 35.6 million.\nVEVO also recently put together a Lady Gaga playlist available online, on the iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch or Android devices using the VEVO for iOS or VEVO for Android apps. The playlist includes live versions of \"Edge of Glory/Judas\" and \"Born this Way\u2019 from the May 21 season finale of Saturday Night Live.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\niTunes Countdown\n\nThe title track of Born This Way in February became the fastest-selling single ever on iTunes stores worldwide.\nCapitalizing on her success, Lady Gaga released two additional songs in advance exclusively on iTunes. Fans got to hear \"Edge of Glory\" on May 9 and \"Hair\" on May 16 ahead of the May  23 album release.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nGagaVision Videos\nA fan favorite, GagaVision gives her Little Monsters a behind-the-scenes look at Gaga. In some of the videos, which are posted on YouTube, Gaga candidly discusses the creative process behind BTW. In other clips, fans get to see the people and places surrounding Gaga.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTwitter &amp; TwitPic Trends\n\nIn May, Gaga hit a Twitter first by becoming the only user to rack up 10 million followers.\nThe messages she posts incite a tweet storm from her followers who retweet and @mention her comments, pictures and videos, as well as promote the hashtags she uses.\nIn April, for example, she revealed the BTW cover art via a Twitpic photo (seen above). The image garnered hundreds of thousands of views in mere minutes.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nAnd More ... \n\nAs if that wasn't enough:\n\nGaga scattered QR codes (pictured) on the web that led back to iTunes where users could download a ringtone of \"Born This Way.\"\nTapulous, a Disney Mobile venture, launched Born This Way Revenge, a Tap Tap Revenge app game for iPhone and iPod. The app features 17 tracks from the deluxe album version, access to GagaVision, Lady Gaga's Twitter feed, three exclusive chat rooms, the official lyrics and Haus of Gaga event lists.\nGaga became creative director at Polaroid.\nGaga gave comedic musician Weird Al Yankovic permission to include a parody of \"Born This Way\" called \"Perform This Way\" on his new album.\nGaga won MTV OMA awards for \"Most Innovative Artist\" and \"Must Follow Artist on Twitter.\"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nWhat Can You Learn From Gaga?\n\"She's mastered the art of [the] launch,\" Scordato said. \"Every new video or album release is always an event. She and her team recognize that millions of views or album sales don't come overnight.\"\nThe takeaways are: \n\nYou need to build momentum with elements of surprise along the way.\nIntegrate. Make sure all your marketing channels are working together to promote a single brand identity and message.\nUse your fans as your best marketing asset. Encourage and remind them to tell your story and never forget to thank them along the way.\nGive people something to love. If you can do that, you've won half the battle.\n\n\n"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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