TheFARM has launched its first social media campaign for The Smith Family, since winning the account for the charity in August.

As part of The Smith Family's Christmas Appeal, the Facebook campaign aims to expose the impact of disadvantage on the lives of more than 605,000 young Australians living in jobless families today.

The interactive video uses Facebook Connect to give users the opportunity to experience the effects of disadvantage for themselves, bringing their own Facebook friends into the narrative to highlight the isolation and loneliness that often accompanies children who grow up in families with financial difficulties.

Chief Executive Officer of The Smith Family, Lisa O'Brien said, "Social media a great way to help bring our cause to life and to connect more Australians to the issue. TheFARM has created a personal, informative and engaging piece. With 1 in 10 Aussie kids living in disadvantage this Christmas, it's a very important message to spread."

The application was created, designed and built on TheFARM, and is being supported with Facebook ads and wall updates. While donating is a huge aspect of the campaign, sharing the message of The Smith Famliy through social media and growing the community of committed fans on Facebook is the priority.

"Working with The Smith Family has been very rewarding and we are hugely proud to be helping them get their important message across in social!" says TheFARM Managing Director Chris Pile.

TheFARM and The Smith Family encourage everyone to watch the video and share this important message. https://www.facebook.com/TheSmithFamilyAustralia?sk=app_277474692289207

Google unveils brand pages for Google+!

Finally Google+ has opened up pages to allow businesses and brands to join Google’s social network - interesting times ahead.

Google SVP of Social Vic Gundotra said, “So far Google+ has focused on connecting people with other people, but we want to make sure you can build relationships with all the things you care about - from local businesses to global brands - so today we’re rolling out Google+ Pages worldwide.”

Check out TheFARM's new page here!

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Parklife (an Australian music festival) announced to its 50,000+ Facebook fans on Friday its launch of the Ridiculously Expensive Ticket. Coming complete with a slip n slide entrance to the Festival, your own personal drinks caddie, a cocktail named after you to be sold to be sold at the festival all day, your own portable VIP area and lots lots more - the super exclusive, one of a kind ticket will set you back at whopping $7,000. Parklife crowd sourced the inclusions via a series of this vs that questions on their Facebook page pitching crazy options such as 'what would you prefer: your own private drinks caddie or a publicist for your entourage?' against each other. Each question averaged 25,000 impressions with over 1,500 votes overall and was considered so successful that Parklife turned the most popular responses into the Ridiculously Expensive ticket upon whose sale all profits will go to Heaps Decent (a charity dedicated to brining creativity to underprivileged and Indigenous young Australians). Kudos to the event organisers (Fuzzy)!

Burberry is the second of the major luxury brands to announce a social sampling campaign this year offering samples of their new body frangrance (set to launch in September) exclusively to their 7.6 million Facebook fans. Burberry took the unusual step of having their Chief Creative Officer announce the sampling campaign via a youtube video shared on their Facebook page. Similarly, earlier in the year Oscar de la Renta launched its first scent in 10 years exclusively via Facebook - exhausting 25,000 samples and growing their fan base by 40% in just 3 days.

Perfume companies and luxury brands alike have long known that sampling to consumers on what is such a highly involved purchase is vital for sales. Evolving this concept by bringing the sample to fans rather than forcing fans to come to them is a clever way to generate earned media through genuinely engaged customers.

But can the same precept apply to mass beauty brands - particularly those that are a less involved purchase such as a body moisturiser bought in a grocery store? Initial results for recent sampling campaign we did for Aveeno bode well with many recipients returning to the Facebook page to thank the brand for the product, share their love for it and confirm they have already or intend to purchase both the body moisturiser but also other Aveeno products on their next grocery trip. In doing so they have generated countless earned media impacts into the newsfeeds of themselves and their social circle.

Over the last few weeks we have been working on a new Facebook campaign for Moccona.

The idea is “Fall in Love With Coffee Again” and for the next couple of moths that’s what we want our Facebook fans to do.

Each week, an RSVP style relationship profile will be released that relates to each of the Moccona ranges.

We’re also giving away 25 jars of Moccona per week for 8 weeks, to encourage people to tell us what blend they love most.

We’ve launched with the profile for Moccona Classic -  which is listed as the coffee with a strong body that will lift you when you need it.

http://www.facebook.com/mocconaromantics