Thanksgiving may be over, but the real fuss is just beginning. It looks like Christmas 2010 will go down as the first truly social media Christmas. How are big-name retailers using social media to beat out competitors today, Black Friday? We take a peek and give out the grades.

1. Target and Nextag’s #BlackFriday Promoted Tweet

Trying to yell the loudest in a shouting match usually doesn’t get you very far, but that’s exactly what Target was trying to do this week by buying the most popular hashtag of the season, #BlackFriday. It was intended to help broadcast some of the retailer’s biggest deals of the day, but instead Target tweets just got mixed in with all the rest of the general Twitter chatter about #BlackFriday or simply Black Friday. How tough was it to break through the chatter? Target’s most recent Black Friday tweet, which asked customers to check out last-minute deals on its website, only got 14 retweets.

Adding to the confusion is Nextag.com. Only 12 hours before, Nextag had also rented out the space for the #BlackFriday hashtag, punting Target well out of view.

Just how many companies can piggy-back on #Blackfriday, anyhow? The day is still young.

2. Radio Shack’s #ShackFriday Promoted Tweet

Radio Shack took a more personal route, and it looks like it may have payed off. It sponsored the #ShackFriday hashtag, which seemed to localize the discussion better around the company and its special Friday deals. Exact numbers are unclear, but Radio Shack’s tweets have been retweeted hundreds of times. They even asked celeb cyclist Lance Armstrong to pitch in with a get-out-the-tweet blurb that drew an unimpressive 15 retweets. Maybe we’re being too hard on Radio Shack and Lance here, but when you have nearly 2.7 million followers, 15 re-tweets isn’t great ROI.

Elsewhere, Radio Shack is also playing off another Foursquare promotion that its calling #HolidayHero. Foursquare users can unlock a special”Holiday Hero” badge by checking in at select stores in the US. Badge holders win a $75 gift card for use in the store.

Radio Shack is not alone here with location-based discounts. Other companies have teamed up with Foursquare for special Black Friday deals. Sports Authority, American Eagle and Hollister, amongst others, are all offering discounts for checked-in users.

3. The Old Navy social game experiment

As we reported earlier this week, Old Navy teamed up with the massively popular (5.5 million users) Facebook game It Girl for the holiday shopping spree. The game, which allows users to build up a wardrobe in order to attain unquestionable “Hotness,” is putting Old Navy items on its rack. To get people talking about it, the game is hosting a special Back Friday virtual rooftop party called “Gobblepalooza” where gamers can learn to dance “the gobble” and talk about how great their clothes look. Final results are yet to be seen, but one thing is for sure: Old Navy forgot to add any special discount deals to the scheme.

4. Walmart’s Open House

In what seems at first glance an exclusive invite, Walmart is hosting a special “open house” at select US locations. Participants get free samples and special holiday giveaways. What does this have to do with social media? The company is inviting people through Facebook to the event, except it only invited 2,000 of its 2.5 million followers and it didn’t seem to advertise it anywhere else. From the looks of it, Facebook users don’t actually need to do anything except show up to a participating Walmart, making the Facebook event, well, a dud.