Twits start the Tweet Race

All brands want to utilize social media and are now either riding on the SM wave or running to keep up. But you get the impression many of them still just don't get it.

Audi and Mercedes are aiming to compete via social media this Super Bowl with Tweet races; as USAToday reports, both car firms will "offer hefty prizes to consumers who best use unconventional social-media tactics to tweet and digitally tout the foreign brands before the Super Bowl".

So instead of spending time engaging with people the super brands are just going to throw a few cars at people who are willing to do all they can to Tweet, Facebook, Blog and generally whore their communication outlets and digital networks out for a prize.

Urgh.

This is a cheap trick and I hope it is a 2010 fad. Mercedes and Audi aren't interested in harnessing social media, they want to jump on it and use it as a way to avoid having to buy a Super Bowl ad. They don't want to engage with their audience, they do not want to listen to what their fans want, they just want their brands yelled out louder than those on display at half time.

MySpace stopped being a social media outlet because it let brands hijack it and they used it to shout rather than communicate. I only hope other brands realize this isn't what social media is about.