Lance Armstrong Organises a Twitter-Cycle

Lance Armstrong, well known for his love of Twitter, surprised a lot of followers with a tweet last Sunday:

"Hey Glasgow, Scotland!! I'm coming your way tomorrow. Who wants to go for a bike ride??"

And with that the seven-time Tour de France winner invited his fans for an afternoon cycle in Paisley in Scotland. Little did Armstrong realise that his follow up tweet on Monday, "Hey Glasgow - ride's at 12 noon. Location tbd. Stay tuned! Still dialling it in. And yes, I have my raincoat!", would see over 200 fans turn up in Paisley outside the Ashtree House hotel (as well as a huge following on foot!).

Armstrong admitted he hadn't planned a route and just ended up cycling around the town for a couple of hours. After the tour, Armstrong thanked everyone there, saying "Thanks to everyone who turned up to ride in Paisley! I figured we'd have a nice ride for a dozen or so. But 100's came. Haha! Awesome!", adding, "And hope great was it that the Flying Scotsman Graeme Obree came out?? Legend."

Armstrong is a prolific Tweeterer and even went as as far during this year's Tour de France as to cut out all journalists and use Twitter for all his public addresses.

Samsung: Master the Power of the Angles

The latest Samsung online campaign for their ST550 and TL 225 cameras is definitely worth a look. Created by the folks at The Viral Factory, the campaign aims to highjlight Samsung's latest camera models, specifically targeted to the digital savvy, online youth market. Recent research conducted by Samsung showed that a huge percentage of photos are now ‘self-shots’ that people are uploading to their various online / Social Media profiles. With this in mind the camera incorporates an image screen on the front of the camera as well as the back.

The Viral Factory's film is directly inspired by the internet meme , which was all about revealing the truth behind people’s overly flattering profile pictures. Through a cool 'Hot Spot' YouTube video, users can view six different scenarios and characters, each of whom first showing their ‘good’ angle and then reveals the ugly truth. The six characters in question are a troupe of aliens and ghouls, all disguising their true identities for their Social Media profiles.

“The Samsung research revealed that a surprisingly high percentage of photos are ‘self-shots’, so it’s brilliantly obvious to have a screen on the front of the camera as well as the back,” said, Viral Factory founder, Ed Robinson. “These photos are mostly taken to be shared through social media, so our task was to find a relevant idea which spoke to this audience. The ‘Beware The Angles’ meme felt relevant to us, and we thought we could take it a bit further". He added, “Hopefully we demonstrate how even the most grotesque-looking of us can look sexy and cool by using the angles…And offer a couple of tips on how to make the most of the cheats yourself.”

Check out the videos here...


You can also see a video of the phone and its features here...

Rocket Fuel Ad Network Arrives

Today saw the launch of Rocket Fuel, a new hybrid ad network founded by veterans from Yahoo!, DoubleClick, NetGravity, Epiphany and salesforce.com. Unlike existing ad networks, Rocket Fuel bills itself as "the first intelligent ad serving technology platform that combines demographic, lifestyle, purchase intent and social data with its own suite of targeting algorithms, blended analytics and expert analysis to find active customers". The system automatically leverages internal and third-party data using its real-time Progressive Optimisation technique, allowing it to serve a suite of impressions with specific context to each advertiser's individual marketing objectives.

“We saw how important it was to let the data tell you which ad to show, so we let the data tell us what works and what is important. Instead of inflicting on customers thousands of targeting options, we figure out which options are working well and move inventory in that way.” says CEO George John. "Rocket Fuel was founded to disrupt online display advertising with a superior computational approach that blends smart decision making, creativity and science to predict consumer behavior. We understand the last thing the industry needs is just another ad network. It needs a smarter one."

"We believe there is a profound difference between reaching audiences and activating customers," said Richard Frankel, president and co-founder of Rocket Fuel Inc. "For us, it's about marrying many different types of data with advanced technology to create intelligent and dynamic campaigns that reach the people who will buy, blog, tweet or tell their friends about your product or brand. Our goal is to turn passive audiences into active consumers."

Frankel, shows how it works:



Although Rocket Fuel only launched today, it has undergone extensive testing during the last year and already boosts an impressive client list including major brands like Nike, Dell, Microsoft, and American Express. This combined with the capability of reaching 40 million people through 100 million ads per month, are sure to make it an attractive offering to advertisers. So the only question left to ask is do advertisers want another ad network? In my own experience I would say that it all comes down to one simple question; will Rocket Fuel out-perform other networks? If it does it will succeed.

Frankel and John, along with CTO Abhinav Gupta, are ex-Yahoo emplyees.

4320:SYD

Following the huge success of V Australia and Virgin Atlantic's 4320:LA competition that I posted about in July, V Australia, with their agency Droga5, are throwing down a similar challenge to their American customers. In a bid to promote Australia as the ideal and affordable short break destination for Americans, V Australia are seeking 3 Americans to take a trip down-under and experience Sydney, while sending a Tweet every single minute of the 4320 minutes they are there!

In a similar fashion to the 4320:LA contest, there will be 2 stages. The first stage is a basic entry registration of entrant’s email address, full name, date of birth, and, most importantly, an answer to the question “Why should we choose you and two of your mates to take the ultimate challenge in Sydney?” in 140 characters or less (obviously). 3 preliminary winners will then be chosen by a panel of Virgin Blue judges to progress to the second stage based upon literary and creative merit of their answers.

The stage 2 will then see each of the preliminary winners select 2 friends to form their 'Team'. At that point each Team will be interviewed and evaluated on the following criteria:

• the outgoing nature and personality of the Team Members
• the number of Twitter followers each Team member has (if applicable)
• how frequently each Team Member uses Twitter (if applicable)

From their, 1 Team will be selected to participate in the “4320 Minutes in Sydney” Challenge.

This kind of social media challenge is one of the first of its kind to be run in the US, being specifically driven through Twitter. The winners will be expected to undertake a once in a lifetime non-stop three day adventure swimming with sharks, enjoying beers at the Sydney Opera House and, of course, throwing a few shrimp on the 'barbie'. All the time Tweeting every minute of the adventure. Don't forget though, that's not even the prize. The prize, should the Team successfully complete their challenge each team member wins a 'Round the World' ticket with V Australia and Virgin Atlantic.

Jodi McKay, Minister for Tourism for New South Wales said "Recently NSW has had success using social media to entice technology savvy travellers to the State through targeted MySpace and Facebook campaigns. V Australia is moving with the times and seeking out new ways to communicate with travellers that will showcase our great City and State to potential visitors. It's great to partner with an industry provider that is thinking outside the box and embracing creativity and new media in their promotional activity."


The “4320 Minutes in Sydney” Challenge
The Team will take a trip to from Los Angeles to Sydney; including return flights from Sydney to Los Angeles, 3 nights full board accomodation at a 5-star accommodation, leaving Los Angeles on September 8, 2009 and return home on September 13, 2009.

While in Sydney, the Team will be required to send 1 Tweet per minute for a period of 72 hours. To do this they will be provided with a mobile phone capable of sending Twitter messages for the duration of the challenge.

If the Team completes the “4320 Minutes in Sydney” Challenge to the satisfaction of the Promoter and sends 1 Tweet per minute for a period of 72 hours, each Team Member will receive an ‘around the world’ economy airfare.

The Team will be filmed at all times while completing the “4320 Minutes in Sydney” Challenge.

Social Media Blues

"Here's a fun little hoedown about twitter, facebook, youtube, digg... and unrequited love."

Hey, it's Sunday!