It was a simple “aha” moment. Let’s reward people for sharing when they’re buying a new car. The implementation was far more complicated. How can we get this reward to the buyers, and how can we ensure that people will actually bother collecting their reward? So we created a system where your tweet earns you a certificate redeemable for $500 when you buy or lease a new Toyota.

The results show the power of social ideas. Toyota had 500,000 more visits to its website. There was a 99% increase in leads from the prior month. Toyota projected a 10% coupon redemption rate; the campaign delivered 48%. The biggest surprise was that 57% of coupons were used by first time Toyota owners. Thousands of people tweeted from the website, and thousands more tweeted about the idea itself. The event was lauded for empowering Tweeters and recognizing the value of good word-of-mouth. The Press picked up on it too - ABC, LATimes.com, Mashable, Yahoo!, Fast Company, Edmunds.com, all covered it.