Amazon.com Invites its Customers to Create a TV Commercial

Online retailer, Amazon.com, has launched a competition, dubbed "Your Amazon Ad Contest," that invites its customers to create a 30-second TV commercial for it. Customers are invited to upload their submissions at amazon.com/yaac (note: if they are members of withoutabox.com, a service that was acquired by Amazon through its IMDb subsidiary and that is billed as a "streamlined interface for setting up film festivals," they also have the option of submitting their entries via DVD) before July 17th, after which date a panel of judges will review all the submitted videos and select five finalists, based on creativity, overall appeal and how likely an ad is to inspire viewers to shop with Amazon. The finalists will be announced on August 24th, and Amazon customers will then be invited to vote for an Audience Prize winner, while an Amazon judging panel selects a Jury Prize winner.

Both winners will receive a $10,000 Amazon.com gift card: and if the same video wins both prizes, its creator will win a $20,000 card, Amazon says. The winners will be announced September 21st, and, in addition to seeing their commercial on TV, will receive travel and lodging for two to attend a film festival (which film festival has yet to be announced). "One need only look at the customer reviews for Tuscan Whole Milk and the Three Wolf Moon T-shirt to see how many creative and talented customers we have," Steve Shure, Amazon.com's VP of global marketing, said in a prepared statement. "We're excited to invite them to create a television ad for us and can't wait to see what they come up with."