Auto maker Ford is marking the 45th anniversary of its iconic Mustang muscle car with a campaign centered on a Web promotion that will give a lucky handful of fans the chance to experience their mustang dreams, and the rest of us a chance to watch.

The “10 Unleashed” campaign asks consumers to write a 250-word essay about their “ideal Mustang experience” and upload those at The2010Mustang.com. Between now and August, Ford judges will choose select 10 individuals and make those Mustang dreams happen, whatever they may be, sending a film crew along to capture the event and posting it to the Web.

The winners, drawn every few weeks to keep feeding new content to the site, will be chosen on the basis of the creativity, uniqueness and execution of their Ford fantasies. According to reports, about four of them will also be chosen for their drawing power in bringing traffic to the 2010 Mustang site. The first winner, with a video already posted, is drift racer Vaughn Gittin Jr., who drives professionally for Ford and Falken Tires. He’s shown drifting—i.e., doing that kind of precision skidding that made Vin Diesel a star—on closed courses through Tokyo.

The online promotion taps into the loyalty bordering on cultism that surrounds the Ford Mustang, a nameplate the company launched back in 1964. Ford has been building buzz for the new 2010 model since the Web site first launched last August. At that time, it collaborated with ad agency JWT and ePrize to run a “Mustang Stories” contest, asking fans of the pony car to share their photos and 250-word-max stories about their memorable personal moments with the car.

Stories submitted were judged by company judges and the top 25 contenders mounted to the Web site in late October, and the public asked to vote for their favorite story. The winner, a Kentucky soldier on deployment in Iraq at the time of his entry, won an expense-paid trip to the Los Angeles Auto Show in November to see the actual 2010 Mustang unveiled. Better than that, he won a Mustang—although not the ’68 fastback he reminisced about.

As another tactic to build buzz for the car, Ford partnered with video marketplace Filmaka last fall to run a contest that let filmmakers turn in scripts for their own versions of Mustang Stories. In this case, Ford chose 22 of the more than 400 draft entries and gave their authors $5,000 with which to turn them into short films.

The films of ten of those semi-finalists were then selected and showcased in 60-second spots that ran last fall during “Knight Rider”, the NBC remake of the old TV show (this time around starring Ford’s Shelby GT500KR.) After the broadcasts, visitors to the Web site were able to view the finalists’ clips in their entirety.

The grand prize winner of the film contest, again chosen by Ford judges, got the chance to direct a promotional film for the new model’s launch.

Now that those early promotions are done, the brand is interested in buyers who want to make future memories. “During its 45 years, Mustang has touched people’s lives in so many different ways, and we’ve enjoyed hearing those stories leading up to the introduction of the new 2010 Mustang,” brand manager Allison Revier said in a statement. “Now it’s time to look forward and create new stories to fill the next chapters in the history book of America’s favorite muscle car.”

With the site launch and the two UGC contests last year and now the “10 Unleashed” promotion, Ford is making heavy use of the Web in promoting the new Mustang, which will start showing up in dealerships later this Spring. Other than online, the car maker will rely on print ads to drive traffic to the Web site and on appearances at selected live events and rallies such as a four-day Mustang Club of America rally this week in Birmingham AL.

The Web site contains enough other bells and whistles to keep rabid Mustang fans—equaled in their auto-eroticism only by the devotees of the Corvette, and perhaps the late lamented Pontiac GTO—coming back often, to peruse accessory Web sites or scour listings of ‘Stang clubs and forums. An interactive customizer is in the works.

But the shared stories are really the heart of the site.

Here’s Scott Monty, head of social media for Ford, writing in his blog earlier this month about the Mustang Stories contest: “The cynics out there will undoubtedly be asking, ‘Yeah, great. But did this help Ford sell a car?’… But storytelling in and of itself is not about selling; it’s about connecting. Connecting with all people, whether briefly or repeatedly over time, to make them feel like their time was not wasted and that they mattered enough for you to make an effort on them.”

Auto maker Ford is marking the 45th anniversary of its iconic Mustang muscle car with a campaign centered on a Web promotion that will give a lucky handful of fans the chance to experience their mustang dreams, and the rest of us a chance to watch.

The “10 Unleashed” campaign asks consumers to write a 250-word essay about their “ideal Mustang experience” and upload those at The2010Mustang.com. Between now and August, Ford judges will choose select 10 individuals and make those Mustang dreams happen, whatever they may be, sending a film crew along to capture the event and posting it to the Web.

The winners, drawn every few weeks to keep feeding new content to the site, will be chosen on the basis of the creativity, uniqueness and execution of their Ford fantasies. According to reports, about four of them will also be chosen for their drawing power in bringing traffic to the 2010 Mustang site. The first winner, with a video already posted, is drift racer Vaughn Gittin Jr., who drives professionally for Ford and Falken Tires. He’s shown drifting—i.e., doing that kind of precision skidding that made Vin Diesel a star—on closed courses through Tokyo.

The online promotion taps into the loyalty bordering on cultism that surrounds the Ford Mustang, a nameplate the company launched back in 1964. Ford has been building buzz for the new 2010 model since the Web site first launched last August. At that time, it collaborated with ad agency JWT and ePrize to run a “Mustang Stories” contest, asking fans of the pony car to share their photos and 250-word-max stories about their memorable personal moments with the car.

Stories submitted were judged by company judges and the top 25 contenders mounted to the Web site in late October, and the public asked to vote for their favorite story. The winner, a Kentucky soldier on deployment in Iraq at the time of his entry, won an expense-paid trip to the Los Angeles Auto Show in November to see the actual 2010 Mustang unveiled. Better than that, he won a Mustang—although not the ’68 fastback he reminisced about.

As another tactic to build buzz for the car, Ford partnered with video marketplace Filmaka last fall to run a contest that let filmmakers turn in scripts for their own versions of Mustang Stories. In this case, Ford chose 22 of the more than 400 draft entries and gave their authors $5,000 with which to turn them into short films.

The films of ten of those semi-finalists were then selected and showcased in 60-second spots that ran last fall during “Knight Rider”, the NBC remake of the old TV show (this time around starring Ford’s Shelby GT500KR.) After the broadcasts, visitors to the Web site were able to view the finalists’ clips in their entirety.

The grand prize winner of the film contest, again chosen by Ford judges, got the chance to direct a promotional film for the new model’s launch.

Now that those early promotions are done, the brand is interested in buyers who want to make future memories. “During its 45 years, Mustang has touched people’s lives in so many different ways, and we’ve enjoyed hearing those stories leading up to the introduction of the new 2010 Mustang,” brand manager Allison Revier said in a statement. “Now it’s time to look forward and create new stories to fill the next chapters in the history book of America’s favorite muscle car.”

With the site launch and the two UGC contests last year and now the “10 Unleashed” promotion, Ford is making heavy use of the Web in promoting the new Mustang, which will start showing up in dealerships later this Spring. Other than online, the car maker will rely on print ads to drive traffic to the Web site and on appearances at selected live events and rallies such as a four-day Mustang Club of America rally this week in Birmingham AL.

The Web site contains enough other bells and whistles to keep rabid Mustang fans—equaled in their auto-eroticism only by the devotees of the Corvette, and perhaps the late lamented Pontiac GTO—coming back often, to peruse accessory Web sites or scour listings of ‘Stang clubs and forums. An interactive customizer is in the works.

But the shared stories are really the heart of the site.

Here’s Scott Monty, head of social media for Ford, writing in his blog earlier this month about the Mustang Stories contest: “The cynics out there will undoubtedly be asking, ‘Yeah, great. But did this help Ford sell a car?’… But storytelling in and of itself is not about selling; it’s about connecting. Connecting with all people, whether briefly or repeatedly over time, to make them feel like their time was not wasted and that they mattered enough for you to make an effort on them.”