Are you looking to drive viral buzz about your product/service online? Many teams and corporate partners are now leveraging their athlete personalities through unique calling campaigns.

P&G's Degree for Men created an innovative viral campaign leveraging Chad Johnson in 2007. The program, leveraged through TrashTalk85.com, enabled users to select different messages that they wanted Chad Johnson to say to their friends. By clicking through a few online options, users could call their friends directly with a "Trash Talk" message from Chad Johnson...the program was a great way to leverage Johnson, deemed "The Ultimate Man of Risk" in an innovative messaging campaign.

The Florida Panthers recently leveraged the likes of goalie Tomas Vokoun and defenseman Mike Van Ryan to call ticket holders who had yet to renew for the upcoming 2008 season. The team is hoping that providing ticket holders the chance to have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to chat with their favorite players on the team will push some ticket holders over the edge to renew their season tickets. The tactic mirrored a similar move made by the Miami Heat, who utilized the services of injured players to make calls to ticket holders during halftime of a game in April (Source: The Business of Sports).