Amidst the star-studded events and red-carpet glamour of this year’s Academy Awards, marketers too were able to stake their claim on the action. From ad campaigns to live-tweeting, we review the best and worst from one of the year’s biggest events.

The top brand performers included the likes of Samsung, Dior and McDonalds, whose adverts generated the most social engagement- around 5.7 million Twitter clicks and 857,000 Facebook interactions. Taking the number one spot was Samsung, who, according to data company 4C Insights, achieved a 24% affinity lift on Twitter and Facebook. Just 7 minutes of paid-for airtime clearly worked wonders for the brand’s social sentiment. The ads in question focused on promoting the Samsung’s new high-definition TV, SUHD TV, featuring Comedy Central favourites Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele. The second ad showed how a movie could be filmed just by using Samsung devices, including the Note phone, tablet, and Gear VR, its virtual reality headpiece.

Lego was undoubtedly the talking point of the show though, especially in the run up to the Oscars. During this period, social media sites were awash with backlash, as the brand’s movie, “The Lego Movie”, failed to receive a nomination in the Best Animated Film category. Not to be outdone in other ways though, certified Lego designer Nathan Sawaya, commissioned his very own Oscar trophy made out of Lego blocks, which the brand then tweeted a picture of stating, “It’s okay. Made my own!” Aside from that, the film’s Oscar nominated song, “Everything Is Awesome” was performed during the ceremony by Tegan and Sara, to rapturous praise.

One of our favourite campaigns from the night was by Dove. The beauty company released an uplifting video during the pre-show of the Academy Awards, as part of their #SpeakBeautiful campaign. This new campaign is focused on boosting women’s self-esteem on Twitter, drawing attention to the fact that four out of every five tweets posted on body image is negative. In an attempt to counteract the growing problem of self-hatred on social media, Dove and Twitter tested sending out positive tweets in response to the negative, to see what would happen. The two companies created a random Twitter account and @ replied to a user who had tweeted that she was feeling ugly. In response, they told her that she looked beautiful, @ mentioning some of her followers in the process too, who also reiterated the same thing. The aim was to see if a domino-effect could be created, which it was, allowing the negative to be transformed into a positive situation.

While we’re always keen to focus on the good, we can’t help but mention some brands who really did hit a bum note during this year’s Academy Awards. Real-time marketing in the form of live-tweeting was yet again big business, although some brands were a little less impressive in their execution. One of the funniest tweets came from Barney’s, who used the Oscars as a chance to advertise a pair of Givenchy rain boots- due to the fact that there was rain on the night! Like Barney’s, DiGiorno Pizza not only missed the mark, but also mistimed one of its tweets, posting: “The ovens are alive with the sound of pizza again #2015Oscars”, as the show turned its attention to a film about Nazis.

What did you think of the advertising and social media campaigns surrounding this year’s Academy Awards? Did you have a favourite? We’d love to hear your thoughts, so please tweet to us @PracticeDigital and share your comments on our Facebook page.