We Are Social's Monday Mashup #69
A third of UK students follow brands on social networks
A study from IAB UK carried out together with The Student Room found that almost a third of British students are fans of brands on social networks, and that 40% of students find out about new products via friends on social networking sites and 37% from other social media like online communities.
Clearer insight into who UK mummy bloggers are
The BMB (British Mum Bloggers) conducted a survey into who their members are, with some very interesting findings: the majority are aged between 30 and 50, live in London and the South-East, see themselves as middle-class and view their blogging as a hobby rather than a job.
Arguably the most interesting insight comes from questions about why they started blogging – with many seeing it as simply a creative outlet:
But in terms of social media campaigns, the findings that the vast majority either do reviews or are willing to, is an important sign:
Which TV shows have the most engaged viewers?
A survey into TV audiences has returned interesting data about how audiences are discussing shows in real time – by looking at 12 million online conversations over six months, it found that Glee and Sons of Anarchy are the most talked about, whereas Mentalist and Good Wife were at the bottom of the list. It shows that the size of your audience isn’t everything, but rather how engaged they are – and that extending the conversation beyond the show itself is really important. Part of this is something Twitter themselves have highlighted recently – with certain shows displaying a hashtag permanently on screen.
GetGlue hits 1 million users
It’s no surprise considering the previous story, that GetGlue continues to grow – as highlighted this week, with the announcement that the app hit 1 million users during March. It’s interesting to see when people are checking in – because the prime time peak shows how people are all watching programmes together (obvious), and the opportunity to extend conversation pre and post-show (less obvious).
Facebook increases ad prices by 40%
Clicks on Facebook social ads in the last quarter cost on average 40% more than in the preceding three months. Facebook is projected to bring in $4 billion of revenue through its social ads this year, but the price increase will put many off.
Soundtracking – the hot new music app?
Last week saw the release of Soundtracking – it combines the best bits of both Shazam and Instagram, to provide a really social app which looks worth using. Nice.
Turn your Instagrams into postcards
The growing popularity of Instagram means that spin-offs are natural – and the newest of these is Postagram, which lets you send any of your Instagrams as a postcard (together with a message) for 99 cents. It ‘s a really nice app, which should take off.
3 launch live shop
Mobile provider 3 has launched a ‘live shop’ in Sweden – with real people providing customer care and advice over the internet through live video, the desired impact being more completed sales.
McDonald’s free t-shirts for mayors
As part of Foursquare Day on Saturday, McDonald’s gave away free t-shirts to 100 people who became mayors of a McDonald’s restaurant on Foursquare Day. With the campaign designed to drive more people to the restaurants, it seems a really clever way rewarding their most loyal customers. McNificent.
Reebok’s ‘The Promise Keeper’
To promote their ZigTech range of shoes, Reebok released an app last week to push people to keep their promises and undertake the exercise they’ve planned to do. With planned involvement from athletes such as Amir Khan and Lewis Hamilton, it seems a good and social way of ensuring that people go running (and therefore wear their trainers out)…
Virgin’s first social marathon
Hot on the heels of yesterday’s London marathon, Virgin are running a ‘social marathon’ today. Bringing together different parts of the business which usually work separately, the day is centered around getting entrepreneurial ideas from fans and followers, as well as engaging consumers from all the different parts of the business. Looks like after today they’ll be experienced in social media – and I refuse to make an obvious joke around the brand name.
#Twitterjobchallenge
The Guardian decided to find out how easy it is to get a job directly through Twitter, through their Twitter Job Challenge. The challenge involves picking your favourite five prospective employers, and get in touch trying to convince them to give you a job – via Twitter. It’s a really social way of doing things, but whether it will work out for their jobseekers is yet to be seen.
Flip’s unpredictable end
One minute they were crowd-sourcing advice through their social channels – the next they’d been shut down by Cisco: the story of Flip’s end truly is a sad one. They began the day by asking fans for advice on what designs their new camera should be. But slowly, events began to unravel – a fan commented on the Facebook post asking ‘are you guys going under’ and the lack of response from Flip was telling. Despite the sad end, they stayed true to their audience, with a heartbreaking final tweet.
Twitter helps Amnesty International
Historically, Amnesty International has been all about letter-writing – but these days they’ve started using Twitter to great effect: they created a hashtag – #FreeFaizan – to try and get a teenager who had been unlawfully detained, released; and by tweeting directly at the governor in charge, they got their result.
Faizan was freed, primarily because the governor was forced to reconsider his decision. In short, the power of social media in action.
Schweppes’ cool Royal Wedding card
After their successful profile app earlier in the year, Schweppes have continued with their nifty use of social media by creating a giant wedding card for William and Kate which will be hand-signed with individuals’ names, if they like the page on Facebook. It’s part of a wider push to highlight the brand’s limited edition Royal Wedding bottles, and it seems to have some fizz.