Promising younger-looking skin within 28 days, Olay Professional Pro-X is allowing a group of Canadian women to blog about the cream’s effect on them with a ‘Pro X 28 Day Challenge’ campaign, launched today.

But the 28 women will write about more than the reduction in crow’s feet and laugh lines – they are also updating visitors on the Olay microsite about family experiences, issues at work or their attempts to exercise and eat healthier, for instance. Readers are encouraged to rate the posts and share them with friends; they can also download coupons for the Pro X products, and enter to win a $1,000 gift certificate to WaySpa.com.

‘Consumer recommendations are really the most trusted form of advertising,’ says Nadia Codispoti, strategy manager at Starcom MediaVest Group, the agency that handled the media buy for the campaign.’We know that women really trust opinions from other women, and we wanted real women across Canada to try and to share, not only their experience with the product but also their own life experiences,’ she says.

Program creative was developed by Saatchi & Saatchi Toronto, and the contest was a partnership with Rogers Media as the bloggers were selected out of 14,000 hopefuls who applied for the contest through Chatelaine and Flare magazines, which are also promoting ProX28Challenge.ca on their web properties through e-blasts and standard ad units. A double-page spread will also appear in magazines that target the women aged 35-plus demographic.

The only incentive provided to the bloggers, Codispoti says, was complimentary product and a little bit of online fame. 

‘Their incentive was to be a part of this challenge and for their blogs to be published,’ she says.