The Project is "Google Island".

The goal of the project was to promote the city and county of Sarasota as the ideal location for Google to install their Ultra-broadband fiber network.

Working with the local government, merchants and the local media - we created a feeding frenzy (literally) by getting a local island renamed to "Google Island" and as part of the campaign have the Mayor dive with the Sharks.

VIEW PROJECT

The core of the project was driven by social media and putting together a PR campaign around the concept of "Google Island"

A micro-site was launched (www.googleisland.net) where users could nominate (vote) for Sarasota to be selected and also contained videos, information and other news.

A Facebook Page was also created (www.facebook.com/googlefiber) and it attracted over 7,000 fans in less than 3 weeks.

The project was a huge success. Over 80 newspapers, 10 television channels and many blogs covered the campaign. The most notable was front page of the New York Times, a 5 minute segment on CNBC and a segment on NPR "All Things Considered".

The city was mobilized and was uniting around the campaign to support the economic initiative.