E-CONSULTANCY.COM — Sponsorship is brilliant for many reasons; supporting a great cause or event, building awareness of your brand with a new audience and changing opinions of your brand through affiliation. When it comes to something as big as the World Cup, the link between sponsors and the main event can appear tenuous until you’re introduced to the "concept" behind the relationship through brand messaging. For example, Coca Cola’s desire for people to celebrate goals with a beverage or McDonald’s customers being compelled to avoid or discuss the games in its diners during the tournament. However, communicating these concepts is no longer a mere media-buying activity. International brands now have their social media channels to help them along the way...

MASHABLE — So your business is on Facebook, and brand engagement is up thanks to some savvy social media strategy. You may even be interested in further distinguishing your brand by building a custom landing page for your account. But what kind of value does a custom Facebook Fan Page offer? What are your fans looking for on a social network that they can’t get from your business website? For some insight, let’s check out how some big-name brands have stepped up their engagement by investing a little more TLC into their Facebook presence...

E-CONSULTANCY.COM — What makes a great viral video? This is a problem I’ve been coming up against recently, especially as there’s always the simple risk that when trying to do anything viral: it will either work or it won’t. This is something I’m going to try and explore across a couple of blog posts in the next month or so, as the subject is so huge and complex, but a good starting point seems to be to showcase some of the best examples of viral advertising that currently exist...

INSIDE FACEBOOK — Managing a Facebook Page can be a daunting task. Once you’ve set up a Page for your business or brand, how do you keep the content you share fresh, engaging, and social? For Facebook marketers, mastering the way you share content on your Page’s Wall - arguably the most important feature on Facebook, since updates flow directly to users’ home pages - is crucial. Here are eight tips for effectively updating your Facebook Page...

When Facebook re-launched its fan pages earlier this year, companies were thrilled. At last, there was a solid way to have a presence on Facebook, and users were actually responding positively. Within a couple of weeks it seemed as though every major brand had put up a page. However, very few are using them well. Sure, anyone can build a fan page in under 10 minutes, and some big brands may even attract fans without any real effort. But even if you have 3 million fans, if the extent of their involvement with your brand is that at one point they “became a fan,” is that really benefiting you? The fan pages that are doing it right are the ones that are actively engaging with their fans. These pages have creative content, two-way communication, active discussion boards, videos and images, and a fun and casual tone to match the medium. Below are five mini case studies of brands that are doing everything right when it comes to Facebook fan pages, presented so that you can learn by example...