The research also showed that technology, telecom and media companies are way ahead of the others where social media integration is concerned, with a quarter having integrated social media in their company processes. On the other end of the scale there are the financial and pharmaceutical sectors, with one in three only just starting their social media adventures.

Here’s their research in full:

Air China’s Facebook check-in campaign
To raise awareness of their services from Sweden, Air China partnered up with a number of popular Asian restaurants in Sweden and encouraged guests to check in on Facebook as they sat down to eat. Those with highest number of check ins (and calories, we assume) at the end of the week won a pair of free tickets to Asia. Although it may seem simple, this was a highly successful campaign, reaching over a million people.

When it comes to Facebook brand pages: Local is better than Global
Socialbakers have done a bit of social media sleuthing and determined, once and for all, that local pages consistently result in higher levels of engagement than global pages. Citing both Xbox and BMW as examples, they show that the top local pages result in far higher (10 times higher in Xbox’s case!) levels of engagement than a centralised global page. The benefits of ‘going local’ include content and conversation being more relevant, fans sharing a common language and fans having more in common.

Teens opting for Twitter as older generations ruin Facebook
Since the days of yore parents have been warning their kids about privacy and not sharing too much information online. And kids, characteristically, have not listened and have shared whatever they please with their friends and the friends of their friends. But now a funny thing has begun to happen. As parents begin to disregard their own advice and tentatively setup Facebook profiles of their own, the kids start to fear for their privacy, not from ‘pirates’ or fraudsters, but from their parents. As a result, a lot of teens are now migrating to Twitter in an effort to escape the prying eyes of the older generations. Of course, what is happening here is nothing new, as Alice Marwick, a post-doctoral researcher at Microsoft Research points out, “They just want someplace they can express themselves and talk with their friends without everyone watching”.

Triumph sports bra brand helps women ‘Buddy Up’ for fitness
The Facebook page serves as a match-making service for women looking for a fitness buddy in their area.

Timeline and Open Graph are coming to brand pages
Social marketers are readying themselves for the changes that are to come to Facebook brand pages in 2012, most notably, the introduction of Timeline and Open Graph. Carolyn Everson, VP of global marketing solutions at Facebook:

There’s a lot of speculation [about Timeline]. The goal has always been to have your personal experience on Facebook not be so different than the brand or page experience. And right now, it is different. You have Timeline and you have a page-brand profile. So we are absolutely moving in the direction to sync those up. We believe that brands want to be able to curate how they’re represented in a more visually pleasing way, and we’re in the midst of trying to figure out how best to do that.

and on Open Graph:

We don’t want a mad rush to have every brand suddenly think that the next thing we have to do is an Open Graph implementation. Because then you put stuff out there that people don’t care about, and that they don’t really share, and they turn it off. We’re working brand by brand, and frankly, industry by industry.

Timeline supported by just one in ten Facebook users
When it comes to users rather than brands, a survey of 4,000 of them has found that just 8% of users endorse Facebook’s Timeline feature. The survey also found that 51% of those asked were worried by the changes and just 8% said they would get used to them. Of course time will tell whether the changes are accepted in the long run. It tends to be the case that redesigns of this sort are met with uproar at first, then quiet consternation and finally accepted as the status quo and the whole cycle repeats itself ad infinitum. Unless, of course, you happen to be Digg.

Facebook beta new social plugin, ‘The Recommendation Bar
Facebook have debuted a new social plugin that incorporates some of Facebook’s Open Graph features. Essentially, it boils down to a ‘Recommendation Bar’ that gives readers ‘Social Recommendations’ on similar content they are likely to enjoy or that their friends enjoyed, an ‘Omnipresent Like’ button to ensure that user’s ability to Like a page isn’t hampered by poor site design and the ability to switch on ‘Frictionless Sharing’.

Over 5 billion songs have been shared on Facebook since the f8 conference
Since September, over 5 billion songs have been shared as a result of Facebook’s ‘frictionless sharing’ feature, although the jury’s still out on whether or not frictionless sharing is a hit with users. Some critics say that it has reduced the sharing of content to a passive activity, others say it is intrusive. Even so, it is hard to argue with the numbers.

Twitter to roll out more of their fan-dangled brand pages to big spenders
The roll out of Twitter brand pages will continue from February 1st onwards, although only to brands that have already committed to spending at least $25,000 on its ad products. Twitter declined to comment on the ongoing roll out of the new brand pages or the advertising spend required to qualify for one, although they did say they are partnering with some individuals and charities for the roll out of its brand pages, one of which will be the American Red Cross.

Twitter analytics to be introduced in the coming months
Erica Anderson, Twitter’s manager for news and journalism, also announced that one of the new features that will be released in the coming months is an analytics service to help content creators track how their content is spreading across the Twitterverse.

Can the caged bird still tweet? Nope, apparently not
Twitter has also announced that it is now able to censoring tweets in certain countries, in order to comply with local laws. The announcement was met with some scepticism from commentators, not least because of the role Twitter played in many of the uprisings that took place last Spring, although Twitter have deflected some of the criticism by opting for full transparency when censoring tweets. In order to qualify for censorship, an ‘authorised entity’ would have to report the tweet or account, which would then be censored in that country, and in its place would be left a notice informing users that the tweet or account in question had been censored for legal reasons. The Thai government have been one of the first to welcome the decision. Hmm…

Facebook, Twitter and Myspace engineers fix Google’s social search results
“Don’t be Evil” was Google’s first unofficial motto. It referred to, among other things, objectivity and parity in the results it returned to users. But since the launch of Google’s social search features, a number of their competitors claim Google has been hoisted on its own petard, with Google’s new results seemingly favouring Google+ results over other networks, such as Twitter. As a result, a group of engineers fromFacebook, Twitter and Myspace have launched the “Don’t be Evil” bookmarklet, which let’s users view the new social search results without this bias. The results are quite impressive.

Google launch new ‘Ask a Friend’ feature
While we’re on the subject of social search, Google have also launched their ‘Ask a Friend’ feature, that essentially sits at the bottom of the search results and when clicked gives users the option to address their search query to their Google+ contacts instead of Google’s many search algorithms. Opening up this feature to include Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook might go some way placating those critics that believe Google is tipping the scales in its own favour.

The G+ name saga continues
It seems like people have been whining about Google+’s policy on nicknames and pseudonyms since before the platform was even launched, and last week they offered a tiny, if impractical concession. You can now add a nickname to appear between your existing names ie. George “The Destroyer” Terry, or to have your name appear in another script, ie., to use their examnple, “सौरभ शर्मा (Saurabh Sharma)”.

Youtube hits 4 billion video views a day
Take a moment to think about that. 4 billion views a day. That’s 4,000,000,000 views every 24 hours. Pretty incredible. Youtube also announced that 60 hours of video is now uploaded to Youtube every minute. This staggering statistic is made even more impressive by the fact that it has increased 25% since May last year.

Lego launch social media platform for fan 
Called ReBrick, the Lego platform is essentially a content platform that allows fans to bookmark content elsewhere on the web and aggregate it on the site, creating a hub for all Lego-related user generated content on the web. A bookmark widget can be installed for easy bookmarking and links can be shared through social platforms.

Brands test virtual currency loyalty scheme
Taco Bell, 7-Eleven, Dunkin’ Donuts and Quiznos are among the brands currently trialling a loyalty scheme that rewards consumer’s purchases with Facebook credits that can be spent while playing games like FarmVille and The Sims.

Kermit the Frog takes to Twitter to promote upcoming film
Disney made their way into the trending topics on Thursday when Kermit took over the @DisneyMoviesUK account and fielded questions from his fans as part of Disney’s marketing efforts around the premiere of the new Muppet movie.

House of Fraser targets students

This time, some work from We Are Social UK  – House of Fraser is embarking on a major marketing push to target students. It has partnered with the National Union of Students’ (NUS) Extra Card, to launch a vouchering app on the House of Fraser Facebook page. The app enables students who “like” the brand on Facebook to receive a 10% discount when shopping on its site. It is also offering “flash discounts” via the social network to students.

Twitter users deported for joking about ‘destroying’ America
In a shocking but amusing story, two British tourists were deported from America before even getting out of the airport, after one tweeted that he planned to ‘destroy’ America. The police refused to believe that it was slang, and he didn’t actually plan to destroy either the nation, its people or its government. A story that seems funny now, but one that could become a common occurrence if the FBI’s plans to monitor social media come to fruition.

Online spending on ads in America will grow 23.3% to $39.5 billion in 2012 as the internet proves its worth to advertisers in a tough economic climate.

Fast growth has seen online pull ahead of some traditional media and this year US online ad spending will exceed the total spent on print magazines and newspapers for the first time, at $39.5 billion vs $33.8 billion. This is the sort of thing that a faux-savant would described as ‘a seminal moment’.

31% of ad impressions are never even seen

Online will still need to continue to prove its worth, as comScore last week produced research that claimed over a third of ad impressions on the web are never even seen.

Working with 12 “national premium brands” in the US, including Chrysler, Ford and Kellogg’s, the report found that in many cases, ads are delivered but not in-view or on target and therefore never have a chance to make an impact.

Where users go, marketers will follow…

Nonetheless, with social media sites beyond Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn seeing significant boosts in usage, both in the US and elsewhere in the world, it is only natural that marketers plan to capitalise on this in 2012:

Rethinking Information Diversity in Networks

New research from Facebook appears to validate the use of social networks in understanding the spread of information first popularised by economic sociologist Mark Granovetter, as well as discrediting popular notions of the web as an ‘echo chamber’ where web personalisation algorithms like Facebook’s News Feed force us to consume an ever more dangerously narrow range of news.

In his seminal 1973 paper, The Strength of Weak Ties, Granovetter found that, surprisingly, people are more likely to acquire jobs that they learned about through individuals they interact with infrequently rather than their close personal contacts.

In a scale unheard of in academic sociological studies the Facebook study observed nearly 1.2 billion instances in which someone was or was not presented with a certain link. The results confirmed the power of weak ties and highlighted how weak ties “are indispensible” to your network as they have access to different websites that you’re not necessarily visiting.

Facebook becomes the premier social network in Brazil

Earlier this week comScore released results showing Facebook surpassed Google’s Orkut in December, becoming the largest social networking destination in Brazil for the first time. In the past year Facebook tripled its audience in the region, but even more impressively increased user engagement, from an average of 37 minutes spent on the site to 5 hours. It remains to be seen whether Facebook can replicate this success and capture the lead in other markets where it doesn’t lead such as Japan, Russia and South Korea.

Some Facebook Pages only reach 17% of fans

Since all the changes in late 2011 it’s clear Facebook has made it tougher for community managers. Teaming up with EdgeRank Checker to examine what was going on, AllFacebook found that (in a review of 4,000 Facebook pages) the average page post is only reaching 17 percent of the Page’s fans.

The advent of the ticker and various apps’ inclusion – like The Guardian and Spotify’s – has clearly had an impact, but it’s worth emphasising that this is the number for an average Page; put simply, effective community management, based on statistical insights and a thorough understanding of how EdgeRank works, can overcome this.

Introducing new apps for Timeline

60 new apps were launched for Timeline last week, with sites such as Foodily, Ticketmaster and Pinterest teaming up with Facebook to encourage users to “enhance your timeline with apps that help you tell your story”. The idea behind it is to share ‘your favourite activities’ with your friends.

Twitter seeing 3 to 5 percent engagement on Promoted Tweets and Trends

Defining engagement as a “click, retweet, reply, or favorite” Twitter have declared their Promoted Products — including Promoted Tweets, Accounts and Trends — a success, with advertisers seeing 3-5% engagement rates on campaigns. Twitter Chairman Jack Dorsey suggested that “advertisers are coming back… [the market] is proving that this is something people want to see more of”. Or so he thinks.

McDonald’s lose control of a hashtag

However, McDonalds show that buying a promoted trend is not necessarily a good thing, as their McStories campaign spun rapidly out of control amid a McFlurry of negative tweets. A big McFail.

Google+ hits 90M users

Google+ is racking up its numbers with Larry Page unveiling a host of impressive stats:

Now when users start typing a hashtag, auto-complete suggestions will appear:

Users can now record and share videos straight from their webcams. Been posting nothing but photos of your cat? Meme-ify them instantly on Google+. We can’t even imagine the number of animal photos that are going to live on the Internet after this.

But the biggest new feature lets users post directly from Google search results to Google+. Searching for your favourite team might leads to news about, say, Thierry Henry, and then you can share this directly to your Circles.

What’s cooking at Foursquare?

Foodies rejoice: mobile check-in app Foursquare has added restaurant menus with prices. So far, they are only available for big chain restaurants in the US, including Dunkin’ Donuts, Panera Bread, Starbucks and Applebee’s, and only on certain platforms (not on iPhone). This comes on the heels of the improved “Explore” tab, which lets users find the hidden gems near them based on tips from other users and begs the question: will Foursquare take over Yelp as the top grub finder for foodophiles?

Tumblr soars past 15 billion pageviews a month

Micro-blogging site Tumblr continues to produce impressive numbers, with it now accounting for over 15 billion pageviews a month. The half-blog, half-Twitter hybrid owes its continuing success to making sharing effortlessly easy. Just 10% of the content on Tumblr is original, but the average post will be reblogged about 9 times.

Sina Weibo’s incredible record over Chinese New Year

Sina Weibo recorded some incredible statistics in the first minute of Chinese New Year, with an average of 32,212 messages per second. It’s a number even larger than Twitter’s tweets per second record, and goes to show just how powerful some of China’s social networks are.

Obama to host a live interview on Google+
American President Barack Obama will give his first ever completely virtual interview from the White House – answering questions on YouTube and hosting a Google+ hangout – after his State of the Union address. Nice idea.

Ticketmaster + Spotify = concert-goers paradise

Welcome to the world of social music through Facebook Timeline. A new app from Ticketmaster will recommend gigs based on your listening habits and history. Yet another reason to delete those tunes you’re a bit embarrassed about, lest you tell all of Facebook that you’re going to (another) Justin Bieber concert.

What you want from Auto Trader

A new app on Facebook Timeline from Auto Trader gives users the option to show friends cars they would like to own. Interestingly, rather than the traditional ‘like’ button, it will include a ‘want’ button instead.

Just like The Dude

Lionsgate is the latest studio to rent films through Facebook and has made its latest film ‘Abduction’ more interactive. Pop-up boxes appear on screen with quotes or a 20-second grab and give viewers the option to post it on Facebook. If one of your friends watches the film later, he can see the comment you left at that point in the film. You can also ‘Like’ the products that your favourite characters are using. Watching ‘The Big Lebowski’? Then perhaps you’d like some Kahlua.

Brewing in the hive mind

Crowdsourcing is bubbling up in the beer world. Untappd (a beer check-in and recommendation service) now lets breweries claim their pages, allowing them to see which of their beers is the most popular and be in contact with their biggest fans. They’ve already picked up 150 breweries thus far, including Dogfish Head, Kona, Boston Beer and Tenth & Blake.

In the same vein, Sam Adams has developed a Facebook app so that fans can create a custom beer, which will be brewed next month. Fans can comment on categories such as colour, body and sweetness. Will the result be delicious or taste like a bad batch of home brew?

You’re in Stephen King’s story

Could your mug be on Stephen King’s next book? To celebrate his next book, the publisher has invited fans to upload their photo onto a Facebook app and revel in their few ‘pixels of fame’.

MINI fans the Facebook flames

Pyromaniacs will get a kick out of this: at the Brussels motor show, MINI launched a new competition so that when Facebook users like their page, it lights a Bunsen burner under a rope attached to a MINI Countryman which one lucky fan won. MINI are on fire at the moment.

Discover Berlin with Hugo Boss

For Berlin Fashion Week, Hugo Boss sponsored Foursquare specials on drinks and starter deals at trendy bars and restaurants around the city. The best boss around.

Cadbury says a big thanks — bar none

To celebrate reaching 1 million Facebook fans, Cadbury built a giant thumbs up out of 1 million chocolate bars. Two days and three tones of chocolate later, fans were rewarded with the sight of the massive treat.

Magical mystery tour with Burton

A new competition from Burton Snowboards lets Facebook fans pack a ‘bag’ with three items of Burton kit, and then pick two friends to join them on their trip (destinations have not been disclosed), should they win one of the three grand prizes.

One Like, One Balloon

Heineken Brazil launched a simple yet effective campaign to get more ‘Likes’ on Facebook: turn a ‘Like’ into a balloon. Soon an empty office was filled with thousands of them, and fans could see updates of the disappearing office.

Secret menu for tavern’s Twitter followers

Way better than In-and-Out’s famous “secret” menu, The Opera Tavern in London is announcing a special burger and the password to order it to only its followers. Just ask for Pierre the manager and tell him, “I’ve got the horn”.

Bald Barbie coming?

After a popular social media campaign, Mattel are still unsure about producing a bald Barbie because of the possible ramifications. Two women whose daughters lost their hair after cancer treatment are adamant that ‘bald is beautiful’.

Hirsute We Are Social MD Robin Grant is uniquely qualified to give his opinion on the issue:

The obvious thing to do would be to release a limited edition bald Barbie with a percentage of the proceeds going to charity. Some companies have a fear of being seen to bow to consumer pressure – but corporate marketing teams must guard against being unchanging and monolithic.

How companies are using digital tools

In the past 2 years, 56% of marketers surveyed felt they were better able to use digital channels to deliver mutual value to customers and their own brands.

For example, marketers are increasingly using Facebook as an online commerce platform, where customers can seek opinions from the brand or their peers before purchasing products from within Facebook itself. Many companies are also harnessing Twitter for customer service – Best Buy’s Twelpforce being a great example.

However, less than a quarter of those surveyed are using analytical tools to refine their decision-making processes, even though 39% have increased access to data and insights.

This reflects an important imbalance: while companies believe that social media are valuable to their brands, their ability to use analytics to better understand their ‘digital customers’ is hindering their ability to use online channels as effectively as they’d like.

The shift towards social

Reassuringly, McKinsey found that there would be a clear shift in focus towards digital tools over the next few years. Interestingly, there will be a diminishing focus on company websites and email as brands invest more in social media.

47% of the marketers McKinsey surveyed plan to use social media sites in future, compared to the 39% that currently do. Their greatest interest currently lies in mobile applications, with 48% of marketers planning to engage customers via mobile apps, compared to the 11% who are already doing so.

Challenges marketers face

32% of marketers agree that being able to generate and leverage deep customer insights is central to effective marketing, but they also say that this poses the greatest challenge to them.

Interestingly, 11% of marketers stated that they face difficulty in assessing the effectiveness of their digital marketing because of the difference between traditional and online metrics.

However, given the vast array of available data about online marketing, and the opportunities to customise tools to report the metrics that matter most to individual marketers, our sense is that this may be more an issue of awareness and comfort levels with the tools than it is one of actual potential.

Widely available tools like Google Analytics provide an incredible wealth of data, and can also include enlightening social tracking, but many marketers are yet to get actively involved in the set-up and analysis of the tracking these tools offer.

Similarly, Facebook’s free Insights offering provides valuable details of the demographics and location of a Facebook Page’s ‘fans’ – data which marketers can use to identify key cultural trends within their audience, or identify areas for growth that can inspire highly targeted communications activity.

The good news is that, although only 14% of respondents have implemented concrete plans to address ‘the data challenge’, almost half are developing, or are in the process of implementing, steps to generate customer insights from online data.

Transparency and fear

Understandably, 22% of those surveyed find managing brand reputation online a challenge, largely because of the open nature of social media. Besides the 19% who already have social media policies in place, a further 38% of marketers surveyed are developing or implementing social media guidelines.

The struggle with online metrics and analysis

Marketers are struggling to assess the impact of digital marketing because of their inability to translate analytic results into insight, or identify the right metrics in the first place.

31% of marketers feel that online metrics do not adequately quantify the financial impact digital marketing has generated for their companies. Alarmingly, 24% can’t even understand what these metrics actually measure.

27% of respondents said they feel that they lack internal leadership on analytics. Meanwhile, one-quarter face difficulty in finding internal talent, and one in ten thinks that their HR department is ill-equipped to identify candidates with analytic skills. The greatest challenge, unsurprisingly, lies in funding.

As a result of all these issues, only 4% of McKinsey’s respondents believe that they possess the necessary capabilities to effectively manage their business.

Our interpretation of these findings is that there is a degree of the tail wagging the dog though; digital and social media provide a variety of tools that can help to deliver greater value to a business, and are not merely obstacles that marketers need to try to ‘get around’.

Metrics should be at the service of the marketer, helping to measure return on investment, and identifying ways to improve the business approach. Our assessment is that, too often, measurement is an after-thought, and too few companies are setting clear objectives for their digital or social media activities before they get involved in execution.

Planning for a digital and social future

Just as the Industrial Revolution turned into an Industrial Evolution that lasted hundreds of years, so will it take time for present-day companies to adapt to and master this ‘Digital Revolution’. This is an on-going process, and it will take time to effectively fuse digital approaches and technologies into all business functions.

In their analysis of the findings, McKinsey reassures marketers that “there’s no single solution” for companies struggling to define their online business model, but they highlight the importance of making use of data rather than merely collecting it.

They also suggest that many marketers may be expecting too much of themselves, and too soon. The world of digital and social media is changing rapidly, and it’s unrealistic for any one person or team to understand everything.

Consequently, marketers should not be afraid to reach out to third-party partners who can help with data analysis, insight, and subsequent strategic interpretation.

After joining twitter at the start of this year, it seems that Rupert Murdoch has been inundated with questions about failing social network MySpace. Murdoch responded curtly:

At Ford, social media is bigger than advertising

Matt VanDyke, director-U.S. marketing communications for Ford has told Ad Age:

At Ford, social media is bigger than advertising

How long will it be before we hear other major brands say the same?

Bad reviews may be good for business

In a report by social commerce company Reevoo, it’s been suggested that bad reviews may actually be good for business. The company found that 68% of consumers trust reviews more when they see both good and bad scores, and if consumers fear tampering if there are no negative reviews.

Facebook places ads alongside social updates in the feed

Facebook rolls out a new way of advertising to friends of fans. Comparable to Sponsored stories, which currently sit on the right hand side of the page, the new Featured stories will actually appear in the news feed. A small difference perhaps, but giving the ad an appearance of being a story rather than a paid for piece.

Although the addition of adverts within the news feed may irritate some users, the adverts displayed will only appear from brands yourself or a friend has already liked. To further reduce a chance of backlash, Facebook have also declared that there will only be one of these ads per day in the feed.

Facebook have also been trialing a new type of coupon promotion. The promotion, which allow pages to post coupons, then promote them with sponsored stories is being used by sandwich chain Which Wich giving fans a little extra for their like. Studies have found, users come to Facebook for exclusive offers and discounts suggesting these vouchers could be a big success if used correctly.

Listen to music with your friends on Facebook

Listening to music with friends has always been seen as a social pastime. Facebook are now taking it that one step further by allowing friends to listen to music on Spotify at the exact same time as each other.

A new button will be rolling out on the ticker and a simple click will have you listening along. The feature will also open up a chat with all of the friends listening in, so when that riff you all love comes in, you can share the moment together.

Google+ added to search, at what cost?

The big news last week was Google’s introduction of what it catchily called ‘search plus your world’ – basically a way of promoting Google+ in its search results. Adam has the full low-down in this dedicated post about the issue.

David Beckham is going Google+

David Beckham is joining the ranks of celebrities already using YouTube to connect with their fans. To ask Beckham a question, fans just have to head over to Google+ and post it including the hashtag #GoogleBeckham.

Of course, Google aren’t going to miss out an opportunity to show of its social network’s functionality, so users of Google+ will be able to hang out with Beckham immediately after the live interview.

Explore the world with Foursquare

The guys over at Foursquare are busy rolling out their new web app, Foursquare Explore. The premise is a bit like Google maps, in that tips and information about local retailers, restaurants and anything interesting are layered over.

Not only does it allow you to search for general recommendations, but also it learns where you and your friends check in to give tailored and accurate results.

TV gets a bit more social

Boxee allows users to find and play video directly from the Internet on their television sets, and now thanks to a partnership with Facebook, TV is to become a little bit more social. The new Boxee live and Facebook intergration allows users to post what they are watching to Facebook for the world to see. Friends can then click the links and ‘check in’ to the shows and find more information about them. Don’t worry just yet; this functionality is optional so your viewing habits won’t be broadcasted to friends without you knowing about it.

Social television seems to be going from strength to strength with TV check in app, GetGlue raising $12M in financing. Not only has the company been successful in raising this amount of money, but they have also announced that over 2M users are checking into their TV Shows.

Latest to hop on the social television bandwagon is MySpace with the announcement that they’re launching a social television experience with Panasonic. MySpace’s service aims to connect viewers with content and each other utilising Panasonic Viera connect TV sets. The package will include Smartphone and Tablet apps so users can access Myspace TV even if they are away from their televisions.

Tebow-mania hits Twitter

Last week during the NFL playoff game between the Denver Broncos and AFC champions Pittsburgh Steelers saw the highest rates of tweets per second (TPS) in Twitter history. As Tebow threw his 80-yard touchdown pass on the first play of overtime and secured a win for the Broncos Twitter erupted at a rate of 9,420 TPS – a new record for sports events.

To put this rate into perspective the previous record was 7,196 at the end of the FIFA womans world cup last summer, and it’s even more than Osama Bin Laden’s death (5,106 TPS), Steve jobs’ resignation (7,064 TPS) and Death (6,049 TPS). It’s a large number, but still far from the all-time record of 25,088 when Hayao Miyazaki’s castle in the sky was aired in Japan.

Facebook gives politico deep access to users’ political sentiments

Simple analysis by volume of tweets or user posts rarely reveals the sentiment behind social media feeling. In a bid to understand the sentiment of voting-age users, a study by Politico and Facebook is set to delve deep into posts to discover the true attitudes towards candidates.

The most notable characteristic is that user data will include Facebook users’ private status messages and comments, a statement that may alarm some, however the mentions will be fed through a computerised analysis tool and never seen by Facebook employees.

#SmokedByWindowsPhone

In this short, but sweet campaign by Microsoft, they offered users a chance to win $100 if they could complete certain tasks on their existing phone before the Windows phone could complete the same task. The penalty for losing was to bite the bullet and admit on camera that you got #SmokedByWindowsPhone, a bold but confidant move by Microsoft, however after winning in 88% of the challenges, it seems to have paid off.

Klout to Crown the First-Ever ‘T-Mobile Social King of CES’

A challenge by set out by Klout and T-Mobile, saw users try to aquire the most +Ks during CES 2012. The user who managed to use their Klout in order to gain the most +K during the event was crowned T-Mobile Social King and given a host of techie prizes.

Tiffany & Co. team up with the Sartorialist to showcase true love

Tiffany and Co. have joined forces with fashion bloggers the Sartorialist & Garance Doré in an effort to discover true love from real couples around Paris and New York.

The venture, True Love in Pictures is the latest venture from Tiffany & Co. as part of their Whatmakeslovetrue.com project. The project has see an Instagram gallery created by the couple and now seeks out to find user generated moments of romance, all captured using the Tiffany & Co. downloadable Instagram filter.

Audi partners with Foursquare for a new badge for Skiers

If you’re hitting the slopes this winter and can’t get enough Foursquare badges, the new Audi Winter Ride badge is sure to be up your street. User can unlock the badge by following Audi and checking in at any ski area, unlocking the badge and rewarding the user with a 20% discount on the Audi collection.

Kit Kat to decide new flavour through Facebook

A new campaign by Nestle, asks consumers to vote for their favourite of four new Kit Kat Chunky flavours with the winner being sold permanently.

Fans will be able to vote on their favourite of the four flavours (double choc, peanut butter, orange or white choc) on Facebook until 24^th February. To add a little incentive to the campaign fans have the chance to win £100 each day for their entry.

While Cadbury UK turns to Google+ to launch Bubbly Bar

Continuing on with chocolate-based news, this week has seen Cadbury launch their new Bubbly bar exclusively on Google+ to their followers. The post (below) was released to fans and then quickly followed by posts on Facebook and Twitter.

Diet Coke launches fashion and beauty Facebook app

Diet Coke have launched a fashion and beauty Facebook app dubbed the Get Glam app. The app is said to be the ‘perfect accompaniment for getting ready with the girls’ and includes fashion and beauty tips alongside a video chat tool. Launched as part of a three-year initiative across brands to link their activity to fashion, the idea is set to appeal to ‘young, fun loving woman’.

A study from the CMO Council of 1300 consumers and 132 senior marketers revealed a profound difference between what consumers want from brands in social media, and what marketers think they want. The study is 31 pages long and worth a read, but being the social people we are, we’ve done it for you.

The report comes to a startling conclusion, but also includes a great deal of interesting data:

The bottom line is that consumers want more—more experiences, more engagement, more rewards, and more reasons to connect with each other and brands through social media. And brands are missing the boat. They see the benefits of reaching out to customers through social channels, but they aren’t yet fully invested.

What’s in a like?

It’s something we’re always discussing internally, and it’s remarkable to see the difference in point of view between marketers and consumers over why people like brand Pages.

For marketers:

For consumers:

The other important question is what do fans expect once they’ve become one? It’s bares repeating that just acquiring fans should be seen as a means to an end, rather than an end in of itself.

That 60% of consumers say they like a Page to interact with other consumers underlines how a Facebook Page should be a community rather than just a Page:

Providing customer service

A lot of the research we’ve covered in the mashup in the past year has highlighted how brands think offering a response on social channels within 3 days is a reasonable timeframe. Judging by the response from consumers, they need to get a lot quicker, and be monitoring day-to-day for potential crises:

The infographic below showcases some of the other key stats which this report has highlighted. We’ll be doing all we can for our clients to narrow this ‘digital divide’.

A Social Media Management System (SMMS) is a software tool that uses business rules and approved employees and partners to manage multiple social media accounts such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. This system contains features such as governance, workflow, intelligence, and integration capabilities across the enterprise. The success of these tools is dependent upon a business-led strategy, defined processes, trained staff, and ability to measure efforts.

These tools are quickly becoming indispensible to brands. Robin Grant of agency We Are Social said, “When you’ve got multiple people involved, both on the brand and agency side, you especially need a tool to manage the conversation.”

As you can tell from the quote above, we contributed to the research, and were lucky enough to have access to a preview copy of the report. Here are the key take outs…

Altimeter created five classifications of SMMS vendor:

And then mapped 27 vendors’ capabilities against those classifications:

But ultimately they conclude:

Despite claims, there is no one perfect SMMS vendor.

We see rapid growth in the market, yet no single solution stands out as able to satisfy all needs of mature buyers. Additionally, we found some over-arching market concerns, including lack of vendor differentiation. Key trends buyers should be wary of include:

A. Market over-saturated and confusing due to funding and low barriers to entry

• Freemium business models spur uncontrolled adoption
• Funding from investors overinflates growth
• Commodity technology results in market look-alikes

B. Vendors lack full capabilities to satisfy enterprise-class buyers:

• Buyers frustrated with lack of monitoring and analytics capabilities
• Relying on APIs from third party social networks is a risk
• Technology is not enough: Agencies fill the gap, serving brands

With which we would concur – having worked with over 10 of the vendors surveyed and also worked with many of our clients to help them select vendors, unfortunately there is no one right answer for the varying needs of different organisations.

I’d liken this market to the social media monitoring space a couple of years ago – vendors are still at an early stage of product development and the market is yet to shake itself out with no clear leaders emerging as yet.

As Altimeter recommend, and as Forrester also recommended in their report on this space last year, brands should seek the help of specialist agencies such as We Are Social to help them navigate this landscape and pick the right solution for them, which will often be a combination of two or three vendors’ platforms.

For those wanting to read the full report, we’re delighted to be able to share it with you below:

1) We are all social
Forrester’s latest round of technographic data shows that social media is truly mainstream and stable, with little change in the US and Europe from last year’s figures, aside from an increase in Joiners (people with a profile on a social network – Forrester’s social media usage scale ranges from Spectators to Creators, depending on how actively they are creating and participating in social content).

However, the area of key interest this year is Asia, notably metropolitan China and India where 76% and 80% of internet users respectively are Creators (compared to 24% in the US and 23% in Europe). This means that almost 8 out of 10 people are generating social content, so look to Asia for the next big social trend…

2) The importance of brand response via social media
According to research from Conversocial, customer service from brands via social media is key. Over 80% of respondents said they would be at least a little put off from buying from a brand that they saw ignoring other customers.

3) Social campaigns improve long term brand advocacy and purchase intent
BzzAgent have found that advocates’ likelihood to recommend a product is dramatically increased from 39% before to 61% directly after exposure to a social media marketing campaign. Even one year later, 55% of brand advocates are more likely to recommend a product.

As for brand advocates own purchase intent, before a campaign 38% said they would purchase, however immediately after the campaign this dramatically increased to 69%, and remained this high for 3 months. Still yet more impressive, after one year, purchase intent was as high as 61%. This demonstrates that social media campaigns are effective at improving metrics which directly affect the bottom line.

4) Marketers’ relationship with Wikipedia to change
It all began with an open letter to Jimmy Wales and Wikipedia, stating how PR professionals and Wikipedia have to work together to ensure Wikipedia is an accurate and available resource to the public, and another blog post from Stuart Bruce drawing the same conclusion – Wikipedia’s current guidelines need changing.

Fast forward two days and Wikipedia had agreed to work with the UK’s Chartered Institute of Public Relations to that end. Roger Bamkin, Chair of Wikipmedia UK, commented:

Recent incidents [...] show that in some parts of the PR profession, a lack of understanding on how to engage with the Wikipedia community persists. We will work with the CIPR to ensure that their members, and through them the wider PR Profession, have access to the clearest possible guidance on the best way to work with Wikipedia.

It will be interesting to see how the CIPR and Wikipedia work this one out…

5) Google applies penalty against themselves
Google recently violated its own guidelines against paid links, when unbeknown to them, Unruly Media conducted a sponsored post campaign on their behalf to promote their Chrome browser, and one of the campaign’s participants failed to use the ‘no-follow’ attribute when linking to the Chrome homepage. After an investigation, Google then applied a penalty against themselves so that searches for “browser” now no longer bring up the Google Chrome homepage, with Chrome’s PageRank lowered for at least 60 days. Our very own Robin Grant commented:

I have a lot respect for Google for taking this action against themselves – although you could argue a two month ban is rather lenient compared to action they’ve taken against transgressors in the past. This incident goes to show the importance of the recently released joint IAB and ISBA guidelines on paid promotion in social media – had Google and Unruly followed these, they wouldn’t have come a cropper, and it does highlight the very real dangers of non-compliance.

6) Facebook’s flagged photos … offensive or just unattractive?
Facebook have determined, that last year, the majority of photos its users reported as offensive were not actually offensive, in fact they were just unattractive or unwanted. The difficulty lay in the fact that often these were photos that friends had posted, meaning the user couldn’t delete themselves, so they resorted to clicking flag instead. After Facebook noticed that the flagging tool was being used for these reasons, the company changed its photo reporting process, allowing users to message the person who posted the photo and complain with the following options:

What vain creatures we are…

7) Instagram allows you to share larger photos… and welcomes the President
Now when you choose to share your photos to Facebook through Instagram, the images will be instantly uploaded to an Instagram Photos Facebook album. These will appear in their full size in user’s newsfeeds and on the Timeline. Instagram also has a new VIP member, the one and only Barack Obama. Not only is he sharing photos through @barackobama, but he also urges supporters to share their photos from the campaign with the tag #obama2012. A clever way to give the public an insight into the daily life of the US President and to observe behind the scenes footage of the upcoming US Presidential Election.

8) Path is the new place to be
Path is where all the tech A-listers hang out these days, at least according to Seesmic’s Loic Le Meur. This new mobile-only social network, with a limit of 150 friends, has created a small, private, place where you can hang out online at any time of day with your close friends, and get notified about them constantly. Path has also recently added the option of sharing to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and Foursquare all at the same time. When people are tired of everything being public, Path just may be their point of call…

9) Levi’s use Instagram to find their latest model
Levi Strauss have opened up the casting to their 2012 Brand Campaign via the world of Instagram. Anyone around the world can upload a photo of themselves with the tag #iamlevis in the hope they will be the next star of the fashion brand.

10) Olympics Games volunteers’ social media restrictions
The Olympics organisers have released social media rules for the 70,000 Games Maker volunteers during the 2012 Olympics. Volunteers are not allowed to mention their role, location, celebrities and athletes, including a ban on photos or posts featuring backstage VIPs. Progressive!

Here are the Top 10 stories in Social Media this week;

1) The 10 Most Influential Brands on Twitter this Christmas

Those crafty infographic merchants at Mashable have got their hands on a great bit of visual data from Klout, showing how big US brands stacked up in retweets and mentions over the holiday period.

Most interesting is the mentions vs retweets in determining Klout score. Amazon (aka Shamonazon) have the highest score, but have relatively few retweets, meaning their score has been influenced by conversations rather than content sharing.

The lesson here? Start a conversation. And be sure to add a ‘via @YOURNAME’ to any Tweet buttons on your page, to start racking up those valuable @replies.

2) Step up your interest in Pinterest
Social bookmarking site Pinterest has been hoarding traffic and press mentions like a hobo with a bottle collection over the past couple of months, and according to print magazine Real Simple, it’s time for marketers to start pinning.

In an article on AdAge, Real Simple GM of Digital Shannon King said the site is driving more traffic for them than Facebook, and is now a valuable part of their social media strategy.

Like Tumblr, Pinterest allows users to post content and Repin interesting content from other users onto their ‘Boards’.

This allows links and images to spread quickly through the network, meaning that a well-curated board could generate thousands of impressions and click-throughs for the right brand.

And with ecommerce sites like Etsy already finding success on Pinterest, it seems the platform is a great place to extend your shopfront in the social web.

And in case you were wondering, yes you can follow We Are Social Au on Pinterest here.

3) Finland fails to get with the time(lines)
Apparently the worldwide roll-out of Timeline, Facebook’s much-vaunted new profile layout, wasn’t celebrated everywhere.

After the switch, users in Finland began deleting their profiles en masse, after news spread that old private message were appearing in the Timeline, something that caused many users to hit the panic button.

The rumour appears to have found traction via a report from the Finnish Broadcasting Corporation, but Facebook quickly confirmed that old wall posts were appearing, not private messages.

The users who deleted profiles will be able to reactivate them easily, meaning this one had a happy Finnish after all.

4) The philosophy of Like
The folks over at eMarketer have published the results of a study by social media CRM firm Lithium, which asked marketers what it means when a user Likes a Facebook page, or engages with a brand online;

The answers appear to be fairly… romantic, with the notion that brand news is more important to a consumer than a promotion or discount, but at least more marketers are recognising the importance of compelling content.

The study also asked marketers to weigh the value of social media activity for their brands;

Unsurprisingly, the opportunity to improve listening, engagement and conversation is recognised as the biggest benefit of social media, something we’ve been saying since we launched in 2008.

If you’d like to know more about how we can help your brand engage in conversation with your customers, give us a call on +61 2 8353 3410

5) Get ready for more Facebook ads
Everyone loves ads, right? Facebook is certainly hoping so, with the platform looking to build on the success of their Sponsored Stories product by offering brands new ways to advertise in the News Feed.

Previously, sponsored stories appeared in the more tradational ad slots on the Facebook page, but from this year they will begin appearing in the news feed;

Advertisers won’t be able to ask for News Feed placement, and users will be able to hide unwanted ads or advertisers from their feed.

It seems getting your brand to appear in the news feed may end up being a game of hide and seek, then.

6) Unsurprisingly, users prefer to login with Facebook
When given the option, more users will login to external sites with their Facebook credentials than any other service accroding to this infographic by Janrain.

Not a great surprise, but perhaps the fact that more users choose to login with their Yahoo IDs than with Twitter will make you spit out your tea. Thought so.

7) Predicting social media trends, Mayan style
The world might be ending this year, but we’re not going to go down without a Tweet.

Spreading Jam have compiled their predictions for the Social Year ahead, and it makes an interesting read, even though some of these seem a bit first base, or entirely off piste.

The renaissance of TV via social media? Sounds a little bit 2011…

8) BBC reports on the rise of F-Commerce, with help from We Are Social
We Are Social MD Robin Grant gave the Beeb a leg-up into the world of F-Commerce this Christmas, adding industry perspective to the report while showcasing our very own Heinz Get Well Soon campaign.

Catch the video on the BBC here. Great work, Robin!

9) Kleenex use social to help us Feel Good
Kleenex showed how to combine social and real-world to create a compelling story this winter, with their Feel Good campaign.

Using listening tools, they tracked down sick people on Facebook, asked that users friends for their address, and sent them a Kleenex care package by courier within the hour;

It’s enough to bring a tear to the eye.

10) We Are Statistics
Everyone likes a good stat, so We Are Social MD Robin Grant, always happy to oblige, has given readers a look under the hood of the We Are Social blog.

In the process, he’s managed to both impress us and fill us with the kind of little brother envy one might get when your big brother gets this kind of traffic…

Between appearances on the BBC and picking up awards, Robin, we don’t know where you find the time.

Here’s to a very Social 2012 for all We Are Socialites!

The Week According To The Internet:

• Single-Serving Tumblr Of The Week: Goths In Trees
• YouTube Video Of The Week: Boy Slaps Brother With An iPad
• How To Deal With Trolls Of The Week: Stephen King

Expecting big things from social in 2012? Leave a comment below!