Ketchup is a popular condiment around the world, and Heinz makes probably the best tomato ketchup there is.
A year ago, Heinz launched a campaign in Germany and placed a domain link with assorted QR code on the label of ketchup bottles.
The web site was about allowing visitors to design their own creative labels; once the competition ended, the domain was left to expire.
All this great, targeted traffic went to waste, a demonstration of an “epic fail” by the Heinz marketing team!
But wait, it gets better – or rather, worse – as the domain was picked up, naturally, by savvy registrants who decided to point it to pornographic content.
As reported by Daniel Korell on his Facebook page, the QR code and the domain sagsmitheinz.de pointed – until May of this year – to hardcore porn.
SagsMitHeinz.de temporarily hosted porn.
The domain and web site are currently down.
There is a lesson to be learned here: when using a domain for large marketing campaigns, keep the domain for several years after the campaign ends – if not, forever.
