Sopranos to Use GoogleMaps in Promotion

When Google Maps launched, it sparked a wave of innovation, as people began to both mash up the service with other sites and just build on top of it, via the API. Advertisers, never too shy to hop on an already-speeding bandwagon, began to wonder aloud how they could use GoogleMaps in their campaigns. This was especially true of certain wide-eyed columinsts ;-).

Well, there's news today that it has finally happened, in a significant way. HBO is going to use Google Maps in an upcoming promotion for The Sopranos, reports AdAge. This is a very cool idea: part of the allure of shows like The Sopranos is that they feel very real, blending elements of the real and the imagined pretty freely. Plotting significant spots on the maps seems very much like an online version of those walking tours of cities, based on televisions shows. There's been a "Seinfeld Tour" of NY for a while, for example.

This also seems like a particularly good tool to provide to the community of fans. We know that discussion around these shows is rampant and focused. Woe to the producers if they ever have a storyline that has one of the characters moving between two places without enough time. Some blogger will plot the points and cry foul...or declare there's some other, more devious explaination for events.

In any event, this is good, not because it uses some cool, relatively new technology. It's cool because it really demonstrates a way of thinking that says "we are looking to more deeply involve you in the story", which is really a way of saying "we're building the brand".