• What’s New in the World of Social Media? November Recap

    What’s New in the World of Social Media? November Recap

    The world of social media is constantly evolving and marketers, business owners and even the daily Facebook user should be aware of the updates. Make sure you are subscribed to our blog to get the monthly news and updates on all things social media sent right to your inbox. Let’s see what happened this past month…

     

    The Return of…. Google+?

    The well-known search engine site is attempting to get back into the social media world with a new feature, ‘Google Posts’. Posts will allow ‘Google My Business’ users to share timely updates with Google users within the Search and Maps functions. According to Google, the posting feature gives you new ways to engage with your customers:

    • Share daily specials or current promotions that encourage new and existing customers to take advantage of your offers.
    • Promote events and tell customers about upcoming happenings at your location.
    • Showcase your top products and highlight new arrivals.
    • Choose one of the available options to connect with your customers directly from your Google listing: give them a one-click path to make a reservation, sign up for a newsletter, learn more about latest offers, or even buy a specific product from your website.

     

    Snapchat Misses Investors Expectations for Growth

    Snapchat’s Quarter 3 reports show that the company brought in $207 million revenue, up 62% YOY, but lost $443 million, which is nearly 4x the amount it lost last year in Q3. While they now have 178 million daily active users, a 17% increase from last year, this has been surpassed by both WhatsApp and Instagram Stories in size. Snapchat is planning a significant re-design to attract more users, which includes paying top content creators in the near future.

     

    126 Million Americans Saw Russian-Backed Facebook Ads Last Year

    This was the number revealed by Facebook general counsel Colin Stretch when he testified in front of Congress in early November. As the entire world has noted, that number is quite a bit more than the original figure of 10 million people that Facebook provided one month ago. A marketing director quoted by Social Times accurately sums it up by observing that this is a great case study for the power of Facebook Ads, just not the kind they have in mind. Moving forward, Facebook is testing a lengthier review process for ads that focus on hot-button topics, but given the number of ads that go out each day, that is going to be difficult.

     

    5 Ways to Get Creative with LinkedIn Video

    At the end of the summer, LinkedIn introduced LinkedIn video, a way for users for share videos with their network. These videos can be filmed with the app, or uploaded to the app after recording. After a few short months of the feature being available, users have started utilizing LinkedIn’s native video functionality in a variety of ways since. Adweek suggests tips on what to do to get the most out of LinkedIn video:

    1. Share what you are working on
    2. Share what is going on behind-the-scenes of your project
    3. Share interviews with people who are passionate about their work
    4. Share professionally relevant and authentic stories
    5. Share a preview of an event

     

    Pinterest President Steps Down

    The current president at Pinterest, Tim Kendall announced that he will be leaving Pinterest at the end of the year to start his own company within the healthcare industry. According to the Social Times, senior vice president for ads and commerce Jon Alferness will take his place. In a statement by Pinterest, “Jon Alferness, senior vp for ads and commerce, will now lead the world-class team driving our rapidly growing ads business. Our focus continues to be measurable and actionable results for our partners while giving Pinners relevant ideas to help them discover and do new things.”

     

    YouTube Stories?

    YouTube posted a blog at the end of November revealing that they will begin testing their own stories feature, ‘Reels.’ The post stated that, “Reels are YouTube’s spin on the popular “stories” format, but designed specifically for YouTube creators. We learned that you want the flexibility to create multiple Reels and have them not expire, so we’ll give you those options.” This new format will not be rolled out to everyone quite yet, but beta testing will begin with some users and then expand. This update was announced alongside improvements to video discoverability, optimizing of notifications and more.

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  • What’s New in the World of Social Media? September Recap

    What’s New in the World of Social Media? September Recap

    As we begin October with fall in full swing, we bring you social media news and updates that took place in the last month. From a new app that brands want to make use of, to the latest in Facebook features, here are the updates you should be aware of.

    Target to Begin Incorporating Pinterest’s Visual Search

    Voice and visual search are supposed to be two of the next big things, and Target is looking to get out in front. A blog post from Target announced that Lens, Pinterest’s visual search function, will soon be integrated into Target’s registry experience and app. Visual search allows you to take a photo and it will provide you with similar products. The days of searching using keywords and scrolling through thousands of products for the one you want could eventually be coming to an end.

    Polly Social Polling is a Hit on Snapchat

    A new app, which goes by the name of Polly, is making waves on Snapchat. Polly allows users to create quick, simple polls (either on their own or through templates) and then attach those polls to snaps on the platform. The polls can be shared on Facebook and Twitter as well, but for the time being, it’s much more of a Snapchat thing. Polly has only been around for about a month, and in that time, it’s picked up 20 million users (99% of whom are teens) and generated more than 100 million votes. As Social Times notes, there’s potential in using the app to gather some nice anecdata on brand perception, user habits and, of course, everyday questions that are fun to ponder.

    Twitter Launches Popular Articles in ‘Explore’ tab

    Twitter may not be the most widely used B2C social platform, but the little blue bird knows its niche, and that is breaking news. According to Adweek, as part of ongoing efforts to solidify and maintain a hold on being the first place people turn to discover what’s happening, Twitter has recently started featuring popular articles in ‘Explore,’ one of the app’s main sections. The articles take into account the user’s location and accounts that he/she follows when selecting which content to feature, so it’s customized for everyone.

    Facebook Removes Ability to Edit Third-Party Links

    Once upon a time, it was quick and easy to customize a shared article on Facebook through tweaking the copy or imagery. In July 2016, Facebook took that capability away from non-publisher pages to tamp down on spam and ‘fake news.’ According to The Wall Street Journal, Facebook has extended that ban to promoted articles as well; in other words, advertisers are no longer able to make edits to news article headlines or metadata because by doing so, they could potentially alter the content in misleading ways.

    Pinterest Tops 200 Million Monthly Active Users

    The more users that a social network has, the more digital real estate it can offer to advertisers. The more digital real estate that social networks can offer to advertisers, the more money they can make. All of this is to say that the brain trust at Pinterest is sure to be pleased that the image-pinning site is adding users at a healthy clip. According to Pinterest, more than 200 million people are using the site every month.

    Facebook live API Updates Shoot for Professional-Quality Videos

    Facebook introduced two updates to its Facebook Live API (application-programming interface) aimed at enabling publishers and developers to create professional-quality live video. The first, automated encoder configuration, was added in response to publishers’ concerns about the challenges of continually fine-tuning their encoder settings to ensure the consistency and stability of livestreams. The second, frame-accurate start times, was put in place so that developers can indicate the exact frame and moment to go live since having a strong start to a broadcast is so important. Facebook Live adoption has been a success, with those now accounting for 20% of videos on the platform, but the quality isn’t always great. These tweaks are a couple of ways the social giant is trying to improve on that (Social Times).

    Facebook is Testing a Group Video Chat App Called Bonfire

    According to Adweek, Facebook may soon be inviting mobile users to gather ‘round the Bonfire.’ The social network confirmed that it is testing a group video chat application called Bonfire in Denmark; it’s a new way to group video chat where users can interact with up to eight friends, plus play with effects and take pictures of the video chats. It’s one more way to get people to spend even more time on the platform, and it’ll be interesting to see how the test group receives it and whether Facebook decides to move forward with this type of feature.

    Business Tools Are on the Way to WhatsApp

    WhatsApp messaging service, which has 1.2+ billion users and is owned by Facebook, has been testing verified business accounts and experimenting with creating tools for those accounts. As of now, it’s still in the early stages, but WhatsApp is approaching these tools along two tracks: one for small businesses and another for enterprise-level companies. According to WhatsApp, “These businesses will be able to use our solutions to provide customers with useful notifications like flight times, delivery confirmations, and other updates.”

    LinkedIn Users Can Finally Upload Videos

    According to Social Times, LinkedIn has begun to globally roll out the ability for users to upload videos to the social platform. Once users are granted access to this feature, they are able to tap on the video icon in the share box at the top of the feed in their iOS applications or the post button in their Android apps to record or upload videos. Users will have access to insights including companies, titles and locations of viewers of their videos, as well as total views, likes and comments, available via the dashboard section of their profiles, on both mobile and desktop. Right now, it isn’t available for company pages, but that’s probably only a matter of time, and when it arrives, brands will have one more option for creative storytelling and messaging on the platform.

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  • What’s New in the World of Social Media? August Edition

    What’s New in the World of Social Media? August Edition

    From the newest social platforms, to changes to your old favorites, here is the latest in social media news that you should be aware of.

    Facebook Limits Video Clickbait

    As part of Facebook’s larger effort to improve user experience, the company will begin to demote posts containing two kinds of video clickbait. According to Social Times, stories containing images with fake video play buttons and videos containing static images will be demoted in the News Feed in an effort to discourage spammers.

    A New Mobile Look for the Facebook Feed

    In a blog post by Facebook’s design team, a new release of changes was explained. The changes, which focused on the News Feed, should make it easier to read, more engaging, and easier to leave feedback. The team decided to change the comments section to include round message bubbles, remove story titles, eliminate empty space, and more.

    Amazon Gets Social with Spark

    Not content with moving into the food industry, Amazon has its eye on the social space as well. Amazon Spark, a social feed of user-posted images, debuted in July and might someday be a potential competitor to inspiration-fueling social channels like Pinterest and Instagram. According to Adweek, users can curate content by following specific interests and people. For now, Spark is available exclusively to Prime members.

    LinkedIn Builds Out Sharing Options + Adds Comment Filter

    According to the Social Times, LinkedIn introduced three new features: enabling users to share drafts of articles to specific users, providing the capability to disable comments, and sharing content with anyone on the web. All of these efforts coincide with LinkedIn’s central goal of attracting more users on a daily basis and becoming more of a hub for social sharing in the mold of larger, consumer-facing platforms.

    Instagram Allows Promotion of Multi-Photo + Multi-Video Posts

    Since February, Instagram has allowed business and personal accounts to include up to 10 photos and/or videos in a single post. Now, businesses have the option to promote these carousel posts. According to Adweek, in the same fashion as a regular promoted post, brands will be able to add paid support via the “promote” button located at the bottom of the content and select from the following objectives: more profile visits, more website visits, and reaching users located near a specific address. Considering the amount of content that can be included within one of these mixed media posts, this is one more way that organizations can get creative when telling a story to users.  

    BuzzFeed Livestreamed Twitter Show to Debut in September

    According to the Social Times, Twitter and BuzzFeed News are creating a new morning show focused on “fire tweets” that will feature reporters and special guests. The show is set to launch September 25th and is titled “AM to DM.” It will be available free-of-charge to logged-in and logged-out Twitter users weekdays from 8 a.m. to 9 a.m. ET on @BuzzFeedNews. Reporters, editors, and special guests will discuss the day’s top stories, bringing headlines from BuzzFeed News reporters all over the world.

    Facebook Expands Related Articles Test in Battle Against “Fake News”

    According to Adweek, Facebook is taking quality control a step further with smarter technology to detect hoax news articles, or “fake news,” as some have termed it. The company will begin using machine learning to identify more potential fake news and share that content with third-party fact checkers. The fact checkers will then share updates below the original post.

    Pinterest Pushes Search and ‘Lens’

    In a recent blog post, Pinterest announced the addition of a new search bar and ‘Lens’ option in their app. The search bar allows users to type in exactly what they are looking for and the ‘Lens’ allows users to snap a picture of something they find interesting and get related items. Both of these items will be “front and center” within the app for ease of use.

    Facebook Puts Even More of a Premium on Fast Load Time

    Facebook is increasingly sifting content by speed, prioritizing stories that load quickly on mobile at the expense of those that take longer. According to Newsroom, in the coming months, stories that load the quickest will rise to the top of feed, while slower content will remain towards the bottom.

    LinkedIn Adds Audience Demographics for Website Visitation

    LinkedIn announced the launch of LinkedIn Website Demographics, a new feature that enables brands to tap into data from the professional network to see who has been visiting their websites. Brands will be able to add the “Insight Tag” to their website, create audiences to track, and apply those insights to their marketing strategies.

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