Sprout Social Advertising

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Sprout Product Enhancements V3.1

Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010

In our latest release of the Sprout platform, we’ve made some improvements and released new features that make creating rich media Engage Ads easier and more efficient. This latest release, known as 3.1, focused on our integration with FBML exporting, conditional content and expandable ad functionality. I will go into more depth on these three features and functionality below.

FBML Exporting

When you create a social campaign, the ability to add this content directly to your Facebook Fan Page or Application previously required a developer.  This is no longer the case.  With our direct-to-Facebook exporting functionality, you can embed your content using a simple snippet of FBML code.

FMBL_export

Conditional Content

As online display advertisements become smarter, they will show you content based on the interactions that you’ve already taken with that ad.  As part of the campaign we just launched with Disney for the movie, Alice in Wonderland, we developed an ad that will dynamically display your content after the first time you interact with it.  For example, if you “Mad Hatter” yourself once, then every additional time you see that ad, it will show your picture and give you access to an exclusive trailer.  Give it a try yourself:

(Tip: if you click the top right section of the ad, it will clear your image after you refresh the page)

Expandable Ads

As many of you have seen, advertisements have the ability to take over a section of your screen that is larger than the ad unit itself. This type of advertisement is called an, “expandable ad” and they are becoming more and more prevalent on popular web sites.  We now have the ability to create these using the Sprout platform.  See the example of an expandable ad for our upcoming event, below:

Ustream Integration, Broadcast Your Event on the Sprout Platform

Monday, January 11th, 2010

The Sprout platform is now integrated with the live-streaming technology, Ustream. We are also working with other live-streaming partners to bring multiple options of live video broadcasting technology to all our customers.

What exactly is Ustream and how does it work on Sprout?

Ustream allows anyone with a camera and an internet connection to broadcast live video to a global audience.  Using the Ustream technology, you can setup a channel and engage your audience within a matter of minutes. Ustream has been used to live broadcast events such as political debates, talk shows, sporting events and more.  While Ustream offers basic embedding functionality, many of our clients asked us for the ability to embed a live broadcast directly into the Sprout Platform so that they can completely customize the look and feel of their broadcast. This is now possible with the integration of Ustream in the Sprout Platform.

We are proud to announce the launch partner for the newly released Ustream component, Dick Clark Productions for the Golden Globe Awards.  Here is the fully functional Ustream live broadcast within a Sprout social experience:

Let us know what you think and if you’d like to run your own Sprout campaign with live stream functionality.

Living Proof Facebook Campaign Sends Free Samples Flying Off The Virtual Shelves

Tuesday, December 29th, 2009

Inside FacebookBy Matt Holliday

Beauty product manufacturer Living Proof recently scored a big hit surrounding a free sample campaign for its No Frizz hair care product. Living Proof used a number of avenues to specifically appeal to its target demographic, taking advantage of Facebook’s ad system to supplement the Free Sample tab on their official Facebook page.

Read the entire article.

Skinnier, box-free Facebook Fan Pages are on the way

Monday, November 30th, 2009

facebook-platform-logo-2At the last Palo Alto Facebook Developer’s Garage, the Facebook Platform and Connect teams announced the 3-6 month developer’s roadmap. This roadmap is publicly available on the Facebook developers site. This is an effort to keep the developers who are building applications and games well informed and not surprised by any of the changes.

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Intel and Sprout launch a consumer-powered Facebook promotion

Monday, November 23rd, 2009

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Become a Fan to Lower Prices for All: Is Intel’s Facebook Ad the Future of Advertising?

Monday, November 23rd, 2009

Fast Company

Your voice is heard with Get Satisfaction and Sprout

Friday, October 30th, 2009

UPDATE: After working with Get Satisfaction for a couple months, we’ve decided to combine our community and ticketed support together using Zen Desk. You can read more about that change in this recent blog post Support Changes at Sprout.

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How Sprout and Jing Work Together

Monday, October 26th, 2009

jing-logo2Recently I was thinking about how a useful tool called “Jing” and Sprouts could work together.

Jing is a lot like Twitter at first: when you try it you might think, “Interesting, but when would I ever use it?” Then you start playing around with it, see how others are using it and you’re hooked.

This is a guest blog post by Michael Britt, host of The Psych Files podcast.

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311 and REI’s Facebook Fan Pages Get Sproutified

Friday, October 23rd, 2009

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The rush to create engaging Facebook fan pages is on, and we’re thrilled to leverage our platform to bring great brands to Facebook. Moving forward we’ll be showcasing some of the best fan page examples through our blog to get you inspired. For example, the band 311 just launched a new fan page to showcase their new album entitled Uplifter. Check it out and take a moment to listen to the entire album through the Sprout. We’re also happy to see REI’s page that features the latest deals from the REI outlet.

And, you can always see our latest examples in our Facebook fan page gallery.

How Flash Developers Use Sprout to Save Time

Thursday, October 22nd, 2009

Widgets2I recently had a conversation with Walter Gross, the Senior Director, Digital Strategy at EMI / Capitol Music Group about how his team of Flash developers / designers are using Sprout to create interactive Flash content quickly and efficiently. Walter has been immersed in the web and Flash design tools since the late ’90s, at a time when, as he puts it, was bombarded by “big and glitzy” Flash elements. Before Walter’s team had discovered Sprout, they were creating all of the content by hand-coding each element. Sprout has turned out to be a huge time-saver and made Walter’s team more efficient.

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