Last week, PepsiCo took the floor at New York’s annual Internet Week…literally. PepsiCo associates from Foodservice, Marketing and PR showcased the Social Vending System, giving attendees demonstrations live from the event. The Social Vending System was debuted at the National Automatic Merchandising Association’s annual One Show in April to much fanfare. More than 100 stories appeared in the press, ranging from the Time magazine Techland blog, the Huffington Post and Gizmodo to CNN.com amongst several others. Read more

Austin, Tex., March 15, 2011: A South by Southwest Interactive-goer mixes self-recorded music beats at the Pepsi MAX truck, an interactive music-meets-digital experience created in partnership with cutting-edge technology BreakBand, a PepsiCo10 company and social music experience that allows users to form virtual bands and create original songs via their mobile phones. Read more

Austin, Tex., March 14, 2011: PepsiCo Talent Engagement and Marketing Leader, Chris Hoyt, demonstrates to a South by Southwest Interactive attendees how PepsiCo is using technology to engage potential applicants and inspire them with the “possibilities” of a career at PepsiCo through a careers application for iPad, iPhone and Droid devices. Read more

Groups Convene SXSWi is legendary for giving the next big thing a platform to hit the mainstream. A couple years ago it was Twitter and micromedia that took over Austin, then came location-based social networks touting Foursquare and marketers pounced – and now group messaging is on the pedestal, establishing GroupMe as one of the forerunners. Recognizing the importance in fueling this dialogue, the first Flash Panel of the day, held at PepsiCo’s Plugged-In Stage, featured “GroupMe Founders Jared Hecht and Steve Martocci with Fast Company’s Ellen McGirt” to discuss how the service is  significantly changing the way people communicate, both socially and professionally. The appeal and convenience of mass texting or starting groups with existing contacts and colleagues to communicate, share photos and locations, has GroupMe well positioned. “Because we’re using SMS, this is a product everyone understands,” said Jared Hecht, Co-Founder of GroupMe. “When we saw... Read more

Is there a tech bubble or should we popping the cork with the bubbly to celebrate the resurgence of tech valuations, IPOs, M&A and start-up activity? Mark Silva lead a panel of today’s top VCs to discuss their take on the subject, how they’re addressing and evaluating in a high-growth capital environment. Read more

PepsiCo Plugged-In Stage: Flash Panels Set in Motion! Highly regarded Mashable editor-in-chief, Adam Ostrow kicked off PepsiCo’s first Flash Panel of the week at SXSWi with “Brands and Digital R&D: PepsiCo10”.   Featuring PepsiCo’s Senior Manager of Digital Media Communications, Joshua Karpf and fellow panelists Tracy Brown (Evil Genius Designs), Benn Gurton (FanFeedr) and James DeJulio, CEO, (Tongal), the panel commenced around PepsiCo10 – yet the dialogue evolved to center on the more recently pioneered ways brands have been participating in digital innovation and why it’s vital that they continue to do so. Crammed with insight, the discussion ultimately came down to how brands must continue to challenge their vision of marketing and communications.  It’s about exploration, examination, striking smart deals and partnerships and showing continued dedication to emerging technology – a space in which we all must live and breathe. Next on the PepsiCo Plugged-In Stage was Bubble... Read more

If you’re following PepsiCo’s efforts in Austin, including our Tumblr and blog portal (with live streaming!), you may be wondering about all the pictures of people making strange movements and shapes with their arms. The answer is our PepsiCo Super Shopper game, development by PepsiCo10 winner, Evil Genius. The game is played through a motion sensor camera that captures your body direction as you direct a shopper in a race to pick up various PepsiCo products. The game can be played with friends, and through the inclusion of various products from our diverse portfolio, we are successfully communicating the broad range of products we offer. Read more

We are really proud of PepsiCo’s participation in Social Media Week. With Bonin Bough’s final keynote at the JWP offices in midtown on Friday, we gained some more perspective from his three continent journey over the course of the week. “The key to PepsiCo’s activation this week was having our people participating,” he said. “This is a unique opportunity to see what the landscape looks like – and it should be our goal to be a trusted participant in these communities.” The participation took many forms, including several PepsiCo professionals speaking on panels throughout the week on some cutting-edge topics. Starting on Monday, Daniel Pellegrom, Manager of Sustainability Communications, spoke at the Hearst Tower for the panel “Social Media and Nutrition Advocacy: How Governmental Guidelines Spur Online Conversations.” Next up was George Smith, Manager of Social Strategy and Execution for PepsiCo Beverages. He showed up to an eye-opening discussion... Read more

Social Media Week New York rounded the corner to it’s home straightaway last night to a packed house at DigitalFlash NYC. The panel, “Who Owns Social?” tried to answer one of the most evidently popular questions of the week – Digital Flash’s 5th Avenue loft was standing room only to hear the panelists – Brian August of Watchitoo, Matt Cronin of WebLiquid, Greg Arzt of General Sentiment, Taylor Valentine of Horizon Media, and our very own Angie Gentile, an assistant brand manager  for Mountain Dew at PepsiCo. And what was the the answer? In short: you. “It’s you who owns social,” said Arzt. “The brand is the sum total of your experiences with it.” “There isn’t a lot of place here for the brand itself,” said Cronin. “The people who represent the brand are more important. We all want to connect with eachother, not an abstract brand. It’s... Read more

Social Media Week continued in full-swing on Tuesday with a in-depth discussion on that most elusive and frustrating of topics: metrics. During the panel, “Metrics, Measurement, and Social Media Scalability,” George Smith, Manager of Social Strategy and Execution for PepsiCo Beverages, and Alex Romanovich and Ytzik Aranov of Social2B consulting hosted a lenghty and informative discussion on the topic. The panel mostly focused on implementation. Now that metrics, tools and engagment companies are a daily fact of life for the digital marketer, what are the next steps? In a word, scalability. “We’ve learned that 85% of marketers indicated that social media marketing generated exposure for their business,” said Romanovich. “What’s important? How we scale it, measure it, and justify it to constituents.” The theme of justification for budgets and scalability was hamemred home by the energetic Aranov. “C-suite executives, those grey-haired men and women who control your budgets,... Read more