On Sunday, Felix Baumgartner leapt from a balloon 24 miles above the Earth, breaking the speed of sound and a setting multiple world records in the process. So much for simply relaxing on a Sunday.  The event, sponsored by energy drink Red Bull, was streamed on YouTube by an estimated eight million viewers and drove plenty of social media conversation, especially on Twitter, where several hashtags jumped out throughout the day.

In total, the event drew over 2.6 million social media mentions on Sunday alone (looking at all social media platforms covered by Salesforce Marketing Cloud).

Red Bull has long established both an excellent social media presence as well as a strong commitment to branding themselves through sponsorship deals.  Tune into any sport, particularly anything with a dangerous edge to it, and you’ll likely find the Red Bull logo somewhere.  From Formula 1 Driving  to the world of Air Racing, Red Bull is there offering up its brand as the official drink of those who like to live on the edge.

Looking at the popular hashtags surrounding the event, we see a strong brand presence for Red Bull as their efforts to associate their brand name to the jump in the minds of viewers appears to have been a success.

While #liveJump leads the way, #redbullstratos and #stratos are close on its heels.  The #redbull hashtag also generated well over 74,000 mentions on Sunday.  While the world is certainly focused on the man himself, Red Bull’s name is squarely in the conversation as well.

This Forbes article from Darren Heitner includes commentary from Ben Sturner, President and CEO of Leverage Agency on the success of Red Bull's branding.

“Sturner believes that the Red Bull Stratos was one of the greatest marketing stunts by Red Bull, and perhaps the greatest marketing stunt of all time. Importantly, Sturner says that there is no way the Red Bull brand could get cut out of the press coverage.”

Indeed, Red Bull has succeeded in attaching its brand to one of the most buzzed about events of the year.  It’s not just the Space Jump, it’s the Red Bull Space Jump.

Social media platforms have played a huge roll in Red Bull’s Stratos branding. Not only was YouTube the place to be in order to watch the event, but they’ve created Twitter and Facebook pages dedicated to Stratos as well as a popular Instagram feed. Tying the Red Bull name to a major event and bombarding the web with Tweets, up to the second updates and incredible images have helped make Red Bull a popular topic of conversation over the past couple of days.

How can your brand benefit from sponsorships and social media? Once you've established the sponsorship, consider these social media tips.

• Create a hashtag with both your brand name and the event (ex. #redbullstratos)
• Skin the event's social channels (Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, etc.) with your brand
• Drum up interest to your social channels with live streaming video content