Press Room

“Zimride provides an amazing online platform for ride sharing,” said Christine Fruechte, president & CEO, Colle+McVoy. “They are truly defining the category through innovation and we are thrilled to be partnering with them.”

Encouraging new means of transportation is nothing new at Colle+McVoy, which is known for its advocacy work in the bike industry. The agency recently launched the successful People for Bikes brand and movement to encourage more people to bike and make our world a more bike friendly place.

Colle+McVoy will be responsible for strategic planning, identity design, advertising, media planning, online marketing, social marketing, promotional materials and public relations. Project budgets are unavailable.

“We have always been proud of our Minnesota roots and we look forward to using our expertise and groundbreaking programs to creatively promote Minnesota as a travel destination and achieve measurable results,” said Christine Fruechte, president and CEO, Colle+McVoy.

Colle+McVoy will assist Explore Minnesota Tourism with strategic planning, advertising, media planning, online/electronic marketing, social marketing, promotional materials, public relations, and additional marketing needs. The marketing budgets have not been finalized.

For 14 years, Advertising Age, the leading global source of news, intelligence and conversation for marketing and media communities, has published a special report on the women in advertising, marketing and media whose accomplishments and potential have made them standouts. The honorees are recognized for having played significant roles in defining the future of their fields.

Fruechte has also been selected by Minnesota Monthly magazine to be the June keynote speaker in its monthly “Women of Influence” speaker series hosted by media personality Sue Zelickson. The luncheon will be held at Ruth’s Chris Steak House in downtown Minneapolis on June 17. More information is available at www.MNMO.com/woi.

YearbookYourself.com won both the Webby Award given by The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences (IADAS) and the People’s Voice Webby Award in the Best Use of Social Media category. The previous iteration of the site won the People’s Voice Webby Award last year in the Viral Marketing category. With nearly 10,000 entries from all 50 U.S. states and more than 60 countries worldwide, the 14th Annual Webby Awards is the biggest in its history and continues to be the leading international award honoring excellence on the Internet. YearbookYourself.com was one of only five finalists in its category and was voted the people’s favorite after more than 700,000 votes were cast online. The cross-section of winners hailing from 14 countries will be honored at an event hosted by B.J. Novak of NBC’s “The Office.” in New York City on June 14. A full list of winners can be found at www.webbyawards.com.

"The Webby Awards honor the very best of the Internet," said David-Michel Davies, executive director of The Webby Awards. "YearbookYourself.com’s achievement is a testament to the skill, ingenuity, and vision of its creators."

The unparalleled Webby win is the latest award for Colle+McVoy, which was also recently honored with four awards in The One Show and won the 2010 Adweek Buzz Award for YearbookYourself.com in the online category.

Over the last two years, www.YearbookYourself.com became an instant hit and a pop culture phenomenon for client Taubman Centers. The site was featured on more than 45,000 Web sites, blogs and media, including USA Today, Tech Crunch, ESPN, VH1’s Best Week Ever, The Early Show on CBS and Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. Numerous high-profile personalities embraced it including Lance Armstrong, Pee Wee Herman and Evan Williams, co-founder of Twitter, who changed his profile picture to a Yearbook Yourself photo. The fun was wildly infectious and there were more than 28 million total visits to the site in the last two years. Once "yearbooked," the site easily allowed people to send their pictures to friends and post them to blogs and social networking sites (this year alone, more than 16 million Yearbook Yourself photos were shared via email or posted to Facebook). And the Yearbook Yourself Facebook fan page garnered more than 70,000 fans.