The app is designed to be played while fans watch the RBS 6 Nations on TV. Throughout the match, the app challenges fans to predict the result of penalties, conversions, 5-metre scrums and line outs, take part in opinion polls, and answer RBS 6 Nations rugby quiz questions.

The RBS 6 Nations Live Challenge was conceived by Synergy, Engine’s sponsorship agency, and delivered by Jam, Engine’s social media and mobile agency.

“This cross platform application is the perfect way to capitalize on the rise of dual screening and to further enhance the viewing experience of rugby fans watching the RBS 6 Nations on TV. By utilizing Facebook Connect we’ve been able to ensure that we can connect friends and fans in a truly, social experience,” says Dan Beasley, Head of Mobile at Jam.

Tim Crow, CEO at Synergy commented, ‘Integrating social engagement with scale and credibility is fundamental to the success of sponsorship in the social media era and this is exactly what the RBS 6 Nations Live Challenge aims to deliver. It’s also testament to the unique fusion of capabilities that, together, Synergy and Jam can deliver for sponsors.’

The free app can is available on iPad, iPhone, Android, as well as Facebook and can be downloaded from www.rbs6nationslivechallenge.com from 3 February 2012. Rugby fans can play along at any point during the RBS 6 Nations championship, starting with the first matches on Saturday 04 February 2012.

The tipping point for Facebook was around 2008, when marketers started to see the huge numbers and realised it was a cost effective way of interacting with consumers.

It was at this point in time, when senior marketers realised social media wasn’t just for kids or geeks, it was for the mainstream and represented a fundamental shift the relationship between consumers and brands. It has changed marketing forever, suddenly putting a huge amount of power with consumers.

My concern with the IPO is there may be increased pressure to bring in more revenue in the future. Based on the estimated valuation of $80 billion the revenue to market cap ratio is 23x whereas Google’s ratio is around 5x.

To date Zuckerberg has been incredible at putting the user first in this whole journey. If they stray from this mantra then consumers may become less engaged and generating revenue will become more challenging.

One of the reasons the valuation is so high is because Facebook has accumulated so much personal data – it still remains unknown how Facebook will monetize this data, however they need to be careful and act responsibly even under new pressure from shareholders to commercialise it.

What’s now absolutely clear is how integral mobile is to Facebook’s future. More than half of Facebook’s users, 425 million people, visited the site via a mobile device in December alone. As we know, these mobile visitors aren’t seeing the ads that are Facebook’s lifeblood. That’s a worry but something they will be addressing very soon. But there is a much bigger opportunity with mobile than purely replicated the ad model – Credits.

It’s not difficult to imagine a world where Credits become so much more than the de-facto currency of Farmville.

Think about it: there’s a huge slice of consumers that access the web via their mobile, are comfortable using location awareness via Foursquare and Facebook check-ins and conditioned to micropayments by their smartphones. That’s a perfect storm for next-level marketing communications, communications that blur the lines between digital and the real world. In the not so distant future, imagine yourself standing outside your favourite shop and you receive a message from Facebook to let you know that you’re entitled to a loyalty discount if you make the purchase using your Facebook credits in your “mobile wallet”.

Right now the sale of Credits only accounts for 11% of Facebook’s revenue (more than $408 million). But if Facebook could connect the dots between mobile users, credits and geo-location or near field communications, the potential is stunning.

You can read the whole Brand Republic feature here, and see what other industry thought leaders have to say about the IPO.

In November, cinema chain Odeon launched its Event Organiser app, which enables users to select films, view screening times and purchase tickets from within the brand’s Facebook page.

People can also create a Facebook event around the film and invite their friends on the network to join, meaning they can coordinate cinema trips.

SOPA and PIPA are designed to address a major area of concern for the American entertainment industry – online piracy.  It’s no question that the pirating of television shows, movies, games, music, and other content is costing the industry millions of dollars a year.  While the numbers aren’t quite as high as the industry’s lobbying groups suggest (MPAA, the movie industry’s lobbying group, estimates the figures are more than $20 billion, but outside observers think it’s more like $400 million), and are dwarfed by profits as a whole, that’s still money that could go to hire more talent, more technical teams, and more writers, rather than just disappearing into the ether.

So it’s not an unfounded concern.  But the trouble with this kind of legislation is that it’s like trying to kill a fly with a log; you might achieve the intended aim, but you’ll end up taking out a lot of other stuff as well.  The way the bills are currently written, it could, through zealous enforcement, mean that any site that hosts any kind of copyrighted material in any way could be subject to action from the US Justice Department and shut down.  For the burgeoning digital industry, which is almost as large an economic driver of the US economy as the entertainment industry, this could amount to economic strangulation; if your site is shut down mistakenly, you could end up being offline for days.  If you’re a small entrepreneur, this could destroy your business; if you’re a Google, that’s millions (possibly billions) of dollars lost.  Not good.

Representatives Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) and Dan Lungren (D-CA) have expressed their concerns that Congress hasn’t had input from technical experts on what SOPA and PIPA mean for the structure of the Internet.  But Representatives Bob Goodlatte (R-VA), John Conyers (D-MI), and Howard Berman (D-CA), say that the Digital Millenium Copyright Act, which currently covers piracy and copyright issues, doesn’t go far enough to protect the industry from losing money every day, which is why action needs to happen now.

Rep. Berman’s district covers Hollywood, and members of the content industry are among his most lucrative campaign donors.   Part of the reason that there is so much urgency about getting these bills pushed through now is, quite simply, the entertainment industry is lobbying Congress to do it.  Public Knowledge, a digital freedom think tank in Washington, DC, claims lobbying groups have spent $94 million on getting SOPA and PIPA passed; in the last election, the entertainment industry donated over $110m to various candidates.  In Washington, lobbying money and campaign donations talk; if Congresscritters’ donors want them to do a certain thing, that thing tends to get done.  The head of MPAA is former Senator Chris Dodd, a Democrat from Connecticut – he’s a former Banking chairman who was known for his ability to raise prodigious campaign funds from the industry he oversaw.  As of August 2011, the group spent 1.2 million dollars on lobbying politicians.

So there’s a fair amount of financial pressure on Congress to get these bills passed.  But there’s also a huge amount of public outcry.  What will win out in the end?  In the House of Representatives, House Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) has said that Majority Leader Eric Cantor has assured him that SOPA will not proceed without “consensus”; which likely means that in its current form, SOPA is unlikely to get to the House floor for a vote.  Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), the bill’s sponsor, says that “markup” of the bill (the process by which the House debates, amends, and writes legislation) will continue in February, but almost certainly not the way it’s currently written, and certainly not without more technical testimony about the Internet’s structure.  An election is coming in November, and the absolute last thing Eric Cantor wants is a huge bipartisan public outcry against Congress when the electorate is in the mood to throw all the bums out.

It’s a different story in the Senate, however.  Legislation can arise from either the House or the Senate, and when there is a large or important issue before Congress, bills can be written in both houses.  That’s why there are two different versions of this legislation, with minor variations.  Before the bill goes to President Obama to sign (or not), those differences will be resolved in a conference committee.  But because the rules of the Senate are rather different from those of the House, PIPA stands a much better chance of at least making it through the Senate in its current form than SOPA does through the House.

The legislative calendar for the Senate begins on 23 January, and Majority Leader Harry Reid has indicated that he will begin the process of moving PIPA towards a floor vote.  Because the Senate is Congress’ upper, more deliberative chamber, debate on any bill will continue until the members vote for cloture, which will mean that there will be a 30 hour time limit on debate subject to the members agreeing that debate should end.  Cloture must be achieved by 3/5ths of the Senate voting for it, or 60 members.  Last year, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) put a hold on this bill, signalling that he would lead a filibuster on it, which means he would stall the bill by endless debate.  There will, therefore, be a contentious effort to avoid cloture on the bill, keeping debate open, in theory, forever.

If cloture is not achieved on PIPA, instead of debating it endlessly, it’s likely that Sen. Reid will withdraw the bill, leaving it to either be open to negotiation, or to wither away and die.  PIPA’s sponsor, Sen. Pat Leahy (D-VT), says he will consider adding amendments to the bill to protect internet service providers, but if cloture is achieved, then the bill as it stands could very well move forward to a up-or-down vote in the Senate.  It will then go to the House.

There are currently 40 co-sponsors of PIPA in the Senate, who presumably will vote to invoke cloture.  You can find out who they are here. PIPA proponents will be looking, between now and when the Senate reconvenes on 23 January, for 20 more Senators to join them to invoke cloture.  If this issue is something you care about, you might want to contact a friend who lives in the United States, particularly one who is represented by a Senator not on the co-sponsor list, and urge your friend to get in touch with his or her Senator to express views on this matter.  Senators do really listen to their constituents, and public opinion may be able to sway Senators one way or the other.  It’s important to be educated on the issue but also to speak to your Congressional representatives in a way they understand.  Don’t get hysterical; know the facts, and more importantly, know who to get in touch with.  That’s how we can change policy.

Facebook this week started to roll out ads in its news feed, labelling the ads ‘Featured’ rather than ‘Sponsored Stories’ (nma.co.uk 11 January 2012). new media age spoke to brands and agencies about how significant this will be for the industry and whether it will impact on user experience:

Read the full article and quote from our very own Richard Costa-D’sa here.

The Microsoft Internet Explorer team worked with ZeptoLab (the creators of the game) to bring Cut The Rope to life in the browser and completely free of charge, opening it up to a whole new market.

The game showcases some of the best uses of HTML5 including canvas-rendered graphics, browser based video and audio and CSS styling. Internet Explorer users will be able to unlock special levels of the game which aren’t available elsewhere. Ssshhh, you didn’t hear it here.

What’s more, for those with geek tendencies like ourselves, there’s a whole behind the scenes section which talks you through the making of the game and technologies behind it.

We’re excited to be working with Microsoft over the coming weeks to deliver yet more surprises. Watch this space.

We are living in unprecedented times. In a social media industry that is barely 5 years old, it has helped to elect Presidents, topple dictators, disrupt industries and free customers. The force of change has been truly incredible.

In an age of austerity, eroded institutional trust and permanent uncertainty, brands will be looking for fresh approaches to tackle the Big Questions That Matter. In 2012 the last vestiges of social media scepticism will be thrown aside. A system wide reboot will trigger a consolidation of social business thinking that will help rewire a damaged world with sustainable growth.

In the effervescent social media bubble, trends travel at the speed of light. We have hit pause and listed 12 themes we think will gain a spotlight next year.

Welcome to the reboot: where we reset for the ascendancy of social business.

1. Managing The Ubiquitous Social Glue
2. The Social Business Intelligence Lens
3. Social Mobile is the New Normal
4. Brands as Transmedia Storytellers
5. Social Software Goes Industrial
6. Authenticity in a Transparent World
7. Social Networks: Hyperlocal, Niche and Mainstream
8. Video is the New Default
9. Social Media Measurement Grows Up
10. The Ignition of Social Commerce
11. A Social TV Renaissance
12. Shaping Serendipity for the Social Customer

Click on any of the links above to download our full trend report. We’d love to hear your views in the comments below.

Given our blog-nerd-levels, we thought we’d share with you the blogs we think will continue to see growth throughout 2012…you know, in case you’re stuck with nothing to do other than listen to grandma natter on over Christmas. So without further ado have a look below, we’ve got showbiz, fashion, beauty, tech, web design, football, mummy and daddy blogs. Take a seat and get comfy.

Web Design Blogs

• Abduzeedo – need help with graphic design and Photoshop? You’ve come to the right place. Hoorah.
• Smashing Magazine – professional online magazine looking at all aspects of coding and design.
• Sam Brown – an awesome illustrator and amazing designer, Sam (Interface Designer at Foursquare) blogs creative juice.
• Stuff and Nonsense – blog from the one and only Andy Clarke. Controversial, funny and very very clever.
• Aaron Walter – UX Lead for MailChimp and author of  Designing for Emotion. We freakin’ love MailChimp.
• Mark Boulton – designer, writer and speaker; Mark shares his views on graphic design. He’s published lots of books too.
• ThinkVitamin – CSS3, HTML5, JavaScript, PHP,Ruby, it’s all there baby.
• 1st Web Designer – the holy grail of design. What more’s to say?
• Spoongraphics – the blog of Chris Spooner, he’s the master of tutorials. Grab yourself a cuppa and dig in.
• Elliot Jay Stocks – not a hugely regular poster, but when he does, they’re gems.

Technology Blogs

• Uncrunched – the breakaway blog my Michael Arrington, no longer controlled by AOL, there’s no stopping him.
• TheNextWeb – the UK’s fastest growing tech blog! Great things are predicted to continue for 2012.
• GigaOM – founded in 2006, this continues to produce awesome editorial on leading technologies and trends.
• TechCrunch – the big dawg for stories of startups, acquisitions and funding.
• Engadget – the mother of all gadget sites. Seriously.
• Electric Pig – containing awesome product reviews, this blog’s expected to see huge growth next year.
• Shiny Shiny – tech news that’s easily consumable, for those who want to be on trend with not too much effort.
• Jason Slater – independent tech writer and all round lovely chap.
• Slashgear – tech and gadget obsessed writers bring you all you need to know in bite sized chunks.
• Girly Geekdom – girl geeks FTW! Move over boys…

Showbiz/Entertainment Blogs

• UnrealityTV – feeding our addiction with reality TV. You know you secretly love it!
• Digital Spy – the godfather of entertainment sites. It’s HUUUUUUUUUUGE.
• Holy Moly! – your one stop shop for all things pop culture.
• Mr Paparazzi – so famous, they starred on BB! Excited to see what 2012 holds for them.
• MSN TV – they’re MSN! They get all of the scoops on the big stories of the day.
• Showbiz Spy- love showbiz gossip? So do we. Get involved.
• Hey U Guys – movie fiend? This blog’s for you my friend.
• Blogomatic3000! – movie fanatics with a geeky twist.
• Tellymix – they love telly, we love them.
• Dan’s Media Digest – the blog of a TV addicted male, really very entertaining.

Fashion Blogs

• Angela Scanlon – Ireland’s fashion gem, this girl’s so trendy it hurts. Ouch.
• WIWT – now a social network for fashionistas, Poppy continues to share her daily outfits.
• Style Slicker – split between London and Hong Kong, Kit knows her accessories.
• My Fashion Life – online fashion mag. It’s really rather fab. Lots of ‘slebs too!
• Jazabelle’s Diary – don’t have the earth to spend on a dress? Jazmine looks at second hand chic!
• Thrills & Frills – one of the UK’s hottest up and coming fashion bloggers. You heard it here.
• Le Blow – awesome fashion and lots of swearing. What’s not to love?
• The Style Crusader – fashion blog with beautiful photography. Also happens to be our girl crush.
• Park & Cube – one of the UK’s fashion dahlings. If it’s style you’re after, Shini’s your gal.
• Milk – inspiration for the fashion forward.

Beauty Blogs

• Get Lippie – the gal’s got a lipstick shade named after her. She knows her cosmetics alright.
• Bubble Garm – sharing fabulous product reviews, plus she’s a new mummy, awww!
• Beauty Junkie – the girl with the trendiest nails in London? We think so!
• Cult Beauty – online mag dedicated to bringing you the best in makeup and beauty. You can buy online too.
• Vex In The City – a girl about town? This is the blog for you. Just too cool for skoooooool.
• Lauren Loves – independent blog of a girl with taste as she experiments with hair and beauty.
• Lip Glossiping – one of the bigger UK beauty blogs, it had us with the name.
• Kiss and Makeup – feeling a bit lazy? This content packed blog has loads of videos too. Pop your feet up.
• Cosmetic Candy – it’s got a swatch gallery and pretty kitties too. What more could you want?
• British Beauty Blogger – one of the UK’s fastest growing cosmetics blogs, written by an industry insider.

Mummy/Daddy Blogs

• Made For Mums – for everything baby and toddler, you’ll find it here; with sister sites Think Baby and Junior.
• Memoir Mode – one to watch! Super sexy style blogger and mum challenging mothers to not give up on fashion.
• Inside The Wendy House – a veteran mummy blogger, vlogger and reviewer. Secret geek lies within. We like.
• Frugal Family – the final word on spend thrift domesticity.
• Mammasaurus – what a crackin’ name. The funny mummy and self confessed lover of gin.
• Geek Mummy – she already knows what an SSD is.
• Fashion Mommy – believes in dressing like the stars. Also has kids.
• Reluctant House Dad – one of the best known blogging daddies with a growing following. Blogging daddies FTW!
• Goodbye Pert Breasts – entertaining dad (the name contains the word breasts!) taking us through what he calls “the sticky goo” of pregnancy.
• Gransnet.com – you’ve heard of MumsNet yeah? Well guess what, this is the same but for grannies. For realz.

Football Blogs

• Tangerine Dreaming – tactical insight and refreshingly honest opinion on Blackpool FC. Yeah, Blackpool!
• Cahiers Du Sport – an English blog covering Portuguese football, recently crowned the best International Blog at the NOPAs.
• Dear Mr Levy – often cynical but an amusing blog following the trials and tribulations of Spurs. Cynicism rawks!
• England Football Blog – all things English and yoof related. They know their stuff.
• Miniboro – started as a Middlesbrough website but now also produces illustrations about past footballing greats and events.
• Twisted Blood – football with a great big dollop of humour. Andrew Thomas won Best Contribution to a Blog at the NOPAs.
• Snap, Kaka and Pop – Brazilian footie your thing? This is for you, my friend. Newly crowned NOPA Best Young Blogger at its helm.
• Soccerissue – bite-sized chunks of football news and opinion from around the globe. Easy reading. We like.
• United Rant – honest writings about Man United that don’t always side with popular opinion. Controversial you say?
• Who Scored? – tactics and stats on worldwide football; they make statistics cool! NERDUP!

These are of course, amongst our personal favs. Because we’re surrounded by thousands of awesome blogs every day, these lists are by no means extensive. If you’d like to hear more of our secret web crushes in different fields or even more of the same, let us know in the comments. Oh and whilst you’re there, if you think we’re missing out on the hottest, we never want to be left behind. Drop a link. Drop it like it’s hot.

Devised by Jam, Sun Football Legends is The Sun’s first foray into the booming social gaming sector, typified by games such as Cityville and Farmville, and represents an expansion of the newspaper’s existing gaming portfolio which includes Sun Dream Team and Sun Bingo.

The game has a unique Role Playing Game (RPG) format in which the player steers a promising top-flight footballer through to legendary status by navigating a series of on-field skill-based tests and off-field antics, allowing every player to create their own unique experience.

Sun Football Legends allows the player to dip in and dip out throughout their day. The game combines the humour and fun with the more colourful side of football, all delivered to the player through a unique daily edition of The Sun.

As with most social games, Sun Football Legends is free to play with customers given the option to make premium purchases for virtual goods and enhanced progression.

To start playing Sun Football Legends go to apps.facebook.com/sunfootballlegends

The game itself was developed by our good friends at Enteraction, social gaming experts.

1) It’s nearly Christmas
2) Movember has come to an end

The MoJambo team have done an absolutely amazing job and have raised a phenomenal £1,382.

Our donation system will be running until the 10th December so you still have time to donate that £100 that’s just been lying around your room.

Our admirable Mo Sista Jenny Lau has taken John De Smet’s place and as you can see below, she certainly gave the men a run of their money.

Well done to all involved.

We hope your lips aren’t too cold (that wasn’t an intentional rhyme).

Jason Hyland	Nick Katz	Jan Mikulin	Thom Binding
Dan Beasley	Thom James	Ben Da Costa	Peter Kappus
Jenny Lau	Steve Craig	Jack Swain	Ian Gambier

Go here to support the team mobro.co/mojambo

Consistent innovation is the key to success and here at Jam, we like to think we keep our finger on the pulse.

You can read the full article here on the Brand Republic site.

Of course, if you can earn some extra money doing what you love, all the better. Up until now however, monetisation has always been a bit of a dirty subject as this has often meant giving up valuable space for unsightly ads using a service such as AdWords. For most of us, our integrity far outweighs what little money these ads could bring and so we’ve opted to go without.

Today sees an alternative launched into the market.

Following the recent partnership between WordPress and Federated Media, Automattic today announced that they’re rolling out WordAds on the WordPress.com platform to bring “high quality ads from brand advertisers”, although the exact model is yet to be revealed. Federated Media are of course renowned as being a world-class ad network and for many this would be a far more appealing proposition.

At this early stage, not every WordPress.com blog will be eligible for the program – only publicly visible blogs with custom domains will be considered. Other factors determining whether a blog is accepted include “level of traffic and engagement, type of content and language used”/ As will all advertising, bloggers will have to choose to apply for the program.

In a world where our opinions as bloggers are increasingly valued, maybe now there’s an option that allows us to afford more time to do what we love best. Only time will tell as there’s a fine balance between targeted ads that offer value to the audience and being seen as “selling out”. I’d love to hear your thoughts, please use the comments below.

You can read the full article here on the Brand Republic site.

You can read the full post here on the Brand Republic site.

Reading the obituaries and early knee jerk analysis it seemed that Google had lost before the race before it had even begun.

Analysts and commentators have continued with stories about traffic declines and fading user interest, whilst the snarky twitterati sit high on judgment extolling Google’s failed mission.

But I believe they are overlooking a very large hairy point: do not underestimate an opponent playing the long game.

The long game is always the smart play. And it takes patience and fortitude to get there.

When Chairman Mao Zedong was asked by a journalist in the 1950′s what he thought of the effects from the French Revolution he said “it is too soon to say”. His answer illustrates the current analysis of the Facebook vs. Google war. That this is nothing less than a long term power struggle for the ownership of the social web. And it won’t be concluded for some time.

Twelve features of the Google+ long game:

• Google+ is a force multiplier. Google does not see Google+ as separate product, it IS the product. The social layer that sits across the entire portfolio, is the new oil that is lubricating the entire Google project.
• There are people who don’t use Facebook. I have friends who missed the boat on Facebook who have come to Google+ for brand reasons: they are more comfortable and familiar with the Google experience.
• Google+ will develop into a compelling user experience beating Facebook’s slightly organic and unyielding chaos of activity. Recent UX design changes across the product portfolio is just the start of Google flexing its superior UX design skills.
• New features will pull in rich content creators who will pull in new users. Photographers have already flocked to Google+ because of its great image functionality and presentation format.
• The separation of search and social has officially ended. The seamless integration of social signals into search is the real prize. Social discovery leads to social commerce which leads to $$$.
• They have a warchest of over $40bn to endure a long testing campaign.
• Rumoured launch of a Flipboard competitor will set alight the content wars. Social magazine apps and devices will just be another incentive to bring in users, helping to curate your Google+ footprint in a way Facebook hasn’t done yet.
• Their 80/20 policy will continue to deliver winning product innovations. Chrome, Gmail and You Tube are killer products, but imagine applying a concentrated 20% to ‘social’ and seeing what happens. We have barely seen the beginning.
• The ability to segment followers via Google+ circles will be a catalyst for achieving real Social CRM and therefore social business models.
• Hangouts offer so many opportunities for smart brands. It will be a boon in B2B and for smaller businesses in particular, perhaps revitalising local business along the way.
• Google Wallet and Google+: say hello to mobile social commerce via your Android enabled phone.
• Direct Connect is a small iteration that will pay out big dividends for brands.
• The date of brand pages being launched will go down in history as one small borderline skirmish in the larger battle of harnessing the social web. But in a way Google+ is a complete ruse, a fog on the battlefield, while behind the scenes Google Inc is being reorganised into a social operating system for the 21st century. A structural brand shift, that like the French Revolution, will take a long time to complete.

So there you have it. A few reasons why I think Google+ is here to stay and why we won’t really see the consequences for some time.

Ignore Google+ at your peril.

You can read the full article here on the Brand Republic site.

LinkedIn was founded in December 2002 and it has seen MySpace, Bebo and Friends Reunited come and go whilst it has steadily risen to the top of its tree. To say top of its tree is slightly wide of the mark, it’s in a field by itself, running amok; revolutionising the way we connect in a business sense.

It’s been in recent months that LinkedIn has seen the most dramatic changes as they hit the public eye after floating on the stock exchange. Users reached the 100 million members mark with currently 2 members joining every second and their subscription model is the pinnace of online subscription models. This is not a fan’s blog post though and the negative aspects are evident as the site is information heavy and if compared to Facebook or Google +, lacks the user experience, whilst the Twitter integration is the bain of many users lives.

So why has it been so successful? We need to take a step back to answer that question. Once upon a time, a business’ success was based on the efficiency of their production line, availability of cheap raw materials or the managing of stock levels, that was decades gone by. In 2011, the most important resource now is people, given that skilled professionals are in demand and they have more options of places to work globally.

A fact that was stated in the recent in-talent keynote where the difference between an average hire and a very good hire can be quite drastic, i.e. an average hire that produces £100k worth of profit could be compared to a very good hire who could drive triple that return. Good hires and recruitment strategy are key to business success in 2011 and LinkedIn facilitates that beautifully and at a very cost effective level compared to other sources of finding talent.

So with LinkedIn being one of the original social networks and with social recruiting becoming mainstream, a lot of people are now asking “how does a company use social media to hire good people?”. My answer is that talent acquisition is becoming a marketing discipline in itself. An employer must create a recruitment brand, you don’t just advertise jobs but you become a news aggregator, you talk about the community and culture in your workplace, you create community for related professionals to share knowledge. You engage people.

A common question in social media interviews is; if each social media platform was a horse, which would your money be on? Some say Twitter, some Facebook, brave ones suggest Google + but very few say LinkedIn. It appears LinkedIn is here for the long haul, it’s network is as engaging as the user needs it to be. Some use it every day, some every six months, but in 20 years time when people are looking to change careers, I bet they’ll be using their LinkedIn profile.

The perception gap that the report highlights makes serious reading for business. Whilst getting closer to customers is a top priority for CEOs; more than half of the consumers’ questioned said that they wouldn’t consider interacting with a brand via social media. And for those that would consider it, they want something in exchange for their valuable time, personal data and their ‘likes’ and it certainly isn’t to be made to feel part of a community.

Unfortunately it looks as though many brands have been caught up in the romanticised view of social media. Crowd sourcing, co-creation, peer reviews and community participation all feature highly in the business belief rankings fuelled by the trend that many brand social media sites are created to fulfil marketing briefs around customer engagement.

This change in customer behaviour is echoed by the BT/Avaya report, “The Rise of the Autonomous Customer”. Here, the assertion is made that customers are becoming savvier, choosing and changing channels depending on the situation and trusting advice from a faceless stranger over the more ‘official’ corporate message. Customers understand that all interactions with a brand are aimed at ultimately increasing those impulses to buy which is why they are turning to each other for recommendations and lengthen the purchasing process by using the internet as a research tool.

It’s not all bad news for businesses and brands. The fact that customers are willing to trade data and time for discounts and promotions means that social media can finally become more tangible and the ever elusive ‘return on investment’ ratio can be measured. It also means that since many customers are prefer a ‘self-service’ route rather than interacting with a brand employee that ‘cost to serve’ could be reduced improving profitability; partner this with a guarantee of exclusive content, cheaper prices, quicker response times and an ability to recommend and you will not only counter the fears concerning privacy but you’ll also have a recipe for success in social media.

It’s easy to preach to the converted.
It’s considerably more difficult to explain how a flash based memory drive with no moving parts can transform virtually any computer set-up.
Well at least we found it difficult…

But online, as in life, these things are easy when you know how.
So to promote the launch of the Samsung SSD 830 Series, we set the incredibly knowledgeable tech community a challenge of simplicity:

Drop the jargon, ditch the tech specs and explain the benefits of a Samsung SSD 830 series in a way your mother would understand.

You can enter through the Samsung SSD Facebook page, on selected, quality tech blogs hosting the competition widget and of course, on the agency website shamelessly promoting their own work.

If you’re interested in trying it out click here
Apologies for the quality, you can probably tell we didn’t go to France to film this!

1) Facebook Commerce is “fan commerce”
If Facebook is all about engaging your fans, and rewarding them for their advocacy and engagement, simply replicating your e-Commerce store chez Zuckerberg would be a grave error. F-Commerce also stands for “Fan Commerce”, and your offering should centre around giving your fans something they can’t find elsewhere. This can be in terms of product (Heinz launched the first 3,000 bottles of their Balsamic Ketchup as a Facebook fan exclusive) but also in the way that you structure the store experience. ASOS has integrated F-Commerce options into quizzes, games and competitions on their Facebook page, letting their fans interact and buy in a myriad of fun and engaging ways. For example, fans can ‘shop the look’ from their winning “Future Stylist” competitions entries as well as accessing the entire catalogue without leaving the Facebook platform.

2) Think about retail “events”
So if F-Commerce is about loving your fans back, offering something exclusive and avoiding simply replicating what you sell elsewhere, it’s not surprising that Facebook commerce comes into the fore when thinking about tactical campaigns and launches. When thinking about social retail “events”, exclusivity, scarcity and experience are key. Flash deals, social coupons, group buying schemes and Facebook exclusives all work well, particularly when you give people an incentive to share. Social group buying schemes, like the Innocent Tweet and Eat campaign, do this particularly well: the more the #tweetandeat hashtag trends, the cheaper participants can buy a veg pot.

3) Experimenting with a subscriptions or rentals model
Brands are also experimenting with Facebook as a subscriptions and content hub. Warner Brothers will screen movies via their Facebook page in exchange for credits, whilst play.com found that by experimenting with flash sales and fan exclusives, their average F-Commerce basked was 50% larger than their e-commerce basket, and Facebook referrals to their main store jumped as well.

4) Creating an F-Commerce Strategy
Whatever model you think works best for you, the following tenets will apply:
- Don’t replicate what you sell elsewhere. Try to leverage unique content.
- Experiment with Facebook retail “events” – remember exclusivity, scarcity and social experience are key.
- Create new and compelling offers that give an incentive to share.
- F-Commerce = fan commerce. This a powerful way of giving something back to your fans.
- Make the most of data: ‘likes’ and ‘shares’ can help you narrow your e-store offering to make something suitable for your Facebook community.

‘Alex wrote a review on Jurassic Park’

Relationships between people and content, labelled by Facebook as ‘Edges’, has changed, previously, as well as tagging and commentating, a user could ‘Like’ content, but now they have added the ability to have ‘read’, ‘watched’ and ‘listened’ in fact it can be any verb which gives a much greater level of detail and interaction.

Gone are profiles, we now have Timeline. Timeline provides a real time stream of everything you’ve done all the way back to your ‘birth’ in a slick, blog-like skin. One of the most popular introductions is the ability for users to have more creative expression, choosing a personalised header image.

There is also a new display called ‘Ticker’ located in the upper right hand corner of the Timeline The ‘Ticker’ is a live feed for everything that’s currently happening with your friends, the news feed is then concentrated down to things that Facebook thinks the user finds interesting.

One of the most talked about introductions is the syncing with Spotify, allowing friends to connect and listen to tracks in real-time together. This introduction we believe is the first step towards greater shared content discovery.

So what does this mean for brands? The changes may devalue a Like and drive a higher need to engage with users. However sponsored stories, a less cluttered news feed due to the ‘Ticker’ function, and apps allowing custom ’verb’ buttons within it should hopefully enable brands to be more creative with how they interact with their fans. The new Timeline feature can harness data from previous years to track a consumers interests and engagement with brands over their lifetime.

To demonstrate the unmissable content that Sky has on every day we came up with a great way of involving consumers with an outdoor advert. In 16 commuter stations across the UK, Sky have been running digital out of home billboards prompting viewers to Tweet for a personal show recommendation with #whatsonsky.

The campaign was live across the UK from 4pm – 10pm on Wednesday – Friday inclusive last week and from Tuesday – Thursday at the same times this week. This timing is ideal to target commuter traffic heading home, when people are interested to find out what’s on that night.

We tracked every mention of #whatsonsky and responded from @SkyHD with a recommendation based on what we could find out from that persons Twitter profile. The responses will not only be shown on your phone, laptop, etc, but also on the large screens, putting your name in lights.

Watch the video below to see how it worked.

We started raising money in March this year. So far, we have held quizzes, golf lessons, designed cards and hand-made and hand-delivered cakes to the entire Engine office. In 6 months the Jam team have proudly raised over £1,000.

We wanted to pick a small, local charity where we could see real, tangible results. It had to be an organisation that we were confident would ensure our donations went straight to those in need. After plenty of searching we found SOS Gangs, a St Giles Trust project that focuses on helping young people get out of the negative cycle of gang crime.

The creator of SOS Gangs project, the brilliantly affable Junior Smart came in to talk about his story and how the money is used, please take a look at the video below.

As you can imagine, the issue has become even more pertinent in view of recent events, so if you would like to donate to a cause that helps people get out of the reoffending cycle, please do get in touch. You can see more of their work here

Yesterday’s unveiling of the iPhone 4S has been months in the making, rumour after rumour, tweet after tweet, photoshop after photoshop. Was it worth the wait?

Yes there are some improvements to the technical specification, not many to list but these do include the widely anticipated A5 dual core processor, fresh from the iPad2, and a long overdue 64gb version. The camera has also been upgraded to 8MP which isn’t going to set the market alight, quite frankly Apple cameras never have. Access to the camera is now via one click, this in itself is not revolutionary, I had a SonyEricsson k850i some 5 years ago that did the very same.

Twitter is now deeply integrated. However we knew this was coming via iOS 5 and iMessage will be embedded (Apple’s BBM messenger competitor) will push to all iOS devices. Twitter is an interesting development which will undoubtedly help Twitter gain more users, however it remains to be seen if iMessage will appeal.

They’ve also integrated Siri, the voice-based assistant company they purchased a while back. Although voice command isn’t a new concept for the iPhone, Siri is a huge leap forward in terms of the technology and is obviously aimed at going head to head with Google’s voice search. Bets are being hedged on voice search being the next big thing, however consumer adoption has been slow. What’s interesting with Siri is that location and context comes into it. For example ask it to take you to London Bridge and it will open the map and guide you to London Bridge. This may just be what voice needs to take it mainstream

I feel they’ve missed the boat here on a number of levels; for example the opportunity to give it a fresh look and feel and an upgrade to 4G LTE. NFC is also missing. NFC is what I and many other have really been hoping for, given the potential ability to pay, tap and share, tap and like, the list goes on.

Will this slow the growth of smartphone adoption? No

Will there still be queues on Regent Street come October 14^th? Yes

Will they still sell millions of 4s? Yes

Is this really what we had waited for, No.