Over on the Forrester blog, Jeremiah Owyang takes a look at the result Dell/Facebook campaign, which aimed to improve Dell's products to be more eco-friendly and get green leaning consumers feeling good about the brand. More details can be found at the ReGeneration site.

The campaign was success in that it managed to capture consumer attention with one million votes logged, 1,000 ideas submitted and 197 blog mentions. However, Owyang points out that the concept was a failure in other respects. It was the same point I was making about the Scion/Strawberry frog campaign. Here's Jeremiah's much more eloquent, but similar complaints:

"When it comes to social media, the mentality of short lived campaigns should go away. Communities existed before a brand reaches to them and after the campaign stops. Marketers should plan for long term engagements with these people, rather than short two week spurts. There was clearly traction here and now's the time to step on the gas and continue forward.

Secondly, the artwork created by the winners (and runner ups) should be included in future products, such as digital wallpapers, in the primary branding for Dell, and even the artists should be given an option to continue as sponsored artists. With the relationship forming, take it to the next level. Encourage artwork to be part of next generation green computers, with proceeds going to non-profits or back to the artists to continue forth.

Thirdly, the campaign was limited to Facebook, which isn't the extent of artists on the web, as well as limited to other social networks such as Bebo or MySpace where similar communities can be found. The contest should have been created not just within the walls of a closed gardens, but also spread to the open web."

See the entire Social Media series here.