Steve Davies

It's been a great week for automotive videos as we settle in to the pace of 2011. Ideally we'd limit this to a Top 10 listing, but there are just too many interesting spots to choose from, so forgive this rather lengthy initial post.

We’ve been a little cynical in the past about Hyundai's promotional campaign for the Sonata Turbo, the Sonata is not exactly the kind of car any of us would associate with 'speed' - in fact stick a Taxi sign on its roof and it would look right at home waiting in the taxi-rank at Slough station. But over in the USA, where there's always been a greater affinity for Japanese and Korean marques, Hyundai have been mounting a campaign to transform the Sonata's dowdy image and re-position it as a car to be desired rather than just used.

Back in 2002 the creative team at Crispin Porter + Bogusky felt people were ready to move away from SUVs, so they pitched the idea to MINI and won the campaign to relaunch the iconic brand in the USA using a series of print promotions, outdoor events and marketing stunts.

There's a new social-media campaign that you might want to take a look at if you're a fan of movies such as Gone in 60 Seconds and Fast and Furious - the film, Drive Angry 3D, stars Nicolas Cage and is due to be launched in the UK on 17 February.

What exactly does this say about Toyota marketing strategy for its hybrid poster-child? Was a cow not good enough? Or perhaps on the scale of animal flatulence, the sheep is the harder target to beat and therefore warrants a poster in celebration of such an achievement?

Mercedes-Benz USA has launched a Tweet Race to the 45th Super bowl in what the company describes as a leap of faith into social media. The destination of the race is the Super Bowl on Feb 6 next year, the means of travel is by Mercedes-Benz, the fuel to get there is tweets by the gallon. The prize is a brand-new 2012 Mercedes-Benz C-class Coupe.

MINI New Zealand's Night Test Drives promotion started off innocently enough, offering customers the chance to test drive its latest models on the open road at a time when there was likely to be less traffic and other distractions.

If you've ever moaned about the use of technology for technology's sake, then you'll feast on this latest innovation by Audi's German creative agency. As part of the year-long "30 years of quattro" celebration those clever folk at Neue Digitale/Razorfish in Berlin have come up with an online ad campaign that uses the world's first sudden motion sensor banner!