npower Football League launched the ‘Every Shirt Has A Story’ campaign earlier this month to get fans passionate online for a chance to win a range of league prizes just as the season draws to a close. Technically the campaign accomplished its goal, with a respectable number of fans participating in the contest. But in terms of social media engagement, if this campaign came down to a penalty kick, you could say, it was a sour miss. Here’s what went amiss.

YouTube’s growth has influenced a series of profound changes in the way business and brands communicate online. Here is our opinionated take on the 10 YouTube Videos that have telegraphed those changes. Let us know any major themes we missed (we know you will!)

Storytelling is a phrase that always brings a lot of head-nodding from marketers. It’s all about the story, right?

So why do we continue to build stories for the web age in the monolithic way that still apes an age where we needed one or two big stories a year, the marquee creative, the 30-second spot, that would be rolled out for the mass audience. These “stories” ignore the human side, the social side.

PayPal UK launched an effort last week to boost its social media presence through a giveaway contest dangling free iPad 2′s. Its message: love us and we might award you with this must-have baby. Can boosting social followers through bribes be a genuine lure? More importantly, does it work?

Promoted tweets aren’t just for big brands anymore, it’s now becoming clear. StylePage.com, a month-old Silicon Valley based start-up for all things fashion, tapped Twitter to build some launch buzz and pad its community membership as it aims to take on the top names in online fashion. A big challenge for vertical social networks like Stylepage is building a critical mass of users at the outset. Could Twitter get it off the ground?

For a good 500 years, spanning the 12th to 17th centuries, the Republic of Venice was the world power of maritime trade, with an influence that spanned Europe, Africa and the Far East. Its influence today is greatly reduced, but it’s still a fitting venue to discuss the future of the digital economy as we’ve been doing at the Digital Economy Forum.

Millward Brown released its yearly BrandZ report today ranking the world’s most valued brands, down to the penny. While Millward Brown is the trusted source for overall brand valuation, one thing its don’t seem to take into account is a brand’s social valuation. So we did it for them. Yes, what follows is a rejigging of the league table.

Slim-Fast, of all brands, launched a promoted tweet campaign last week in time to capitalize on all the excitement surrounding the Royal Wedding. Its promoted tweet can hardly be called a precision-based advertising scheme; the tweet was directed at anyone interested in William and Kate, which, as we know from the TV networks, is anybody from urbane Brooklynites to Sydney royalists, plus a lot of people in a certain island in the North Atlantic. Did it work?

I stumbled onto a post (thanks Twitter!) from 2009 by Ross Mayfield, Co-Founder of SocialText, called The Social C.R.M. Iceberg. It’s a long piece but Mayfield’s insights and anecdotes about how social engagement is empowering organizations is worth the time for any of you who are pondering your company’s social strategies.

No more standing in line for the bathroom at the annual sprawling music festival. Wrigley 5 Gum launched a Twitter promoted tweet this past weekend to direct fans to the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival’s live broadcast on YouTube. The “ChoachellaLive” YouTube stream might be the most advanced integration of social media into live music and sponsorship to date.