Meet the Michelin man
Thanks to an article on Imediaconnection I’ve discovered the world of Michelin. Definitely not a topic I’m interested into, but surely a website worth a visit from an interactive marketing and design perspective. First of all it’s a rich experience: there’s a lot of content to discover, and the layout encourages in-depth exploration.
It’s a great exercise of branding online without forgetting the importance of showing the product also. Of course, they did not forget to put the cherry on the cake, by adding some environmentally friendly content as well, dedicating an area to the “Greaner World”.
It’s Flash and 3D similiar, in a way, to the recent Get the Glass advergame (but with much better loading), but also clearly inspired by the Pixar movies. Fast connections and faster CPUs are opening a new era for interface design and online interactivity, and we can expect to have a lot of fun (and a lot of new work to do 
The agency behind the project is Campbell-Ewald.
Hi Martina - The Michelin site is indeed very visually distinctive. Unfortunately, the online advertising that’s been supporting the site is extremely weak. How could they take the legendary Bibendum and make him boring?!
Here are some samples from the campaign:
Michelin online ads
Martina,
Well spotted. It’s rare these days to see a microsite that has been produced to such a high standard.
I (like probably most folks) don’t give two hoots about tires, but I found myself getting sucked into the site!
Best,
Ryan
Well, this is just another clear example of the influence of videogames over advertising. Anyway, what better than a videogame to give life to a virtual world??
it’s a very cool hip tech-inspired site, but it’s pretty light on content — and that’s me being charitable. It’s all flash, no gold.