November social media round-up
Twitter shuts down video platform ‘Vine’. Twitter announced it is closing down the six-second video app ‘Vine’ that it acquired in 2012. The video app let users create and share six-second long video clips. The closure may be due to rapid growth of short-form video production on competitor platforms such as Snapchat, and follows news that Twitter plans to cut 9% of its workforce after experiencing slow growth. All Vine videos will be archived on the website and will still be available to watch on Twitter and anywhere else they were shared.
Google and Facebook crack down on fake news articles. According to Buzzfeed, the top malicious fake news stories on Facebook about the Presidential elections were found to have outperformed the real ones. For example, the news story in first place was headlined “Pope Francis Shocks World, Endorses Donald Trump for President, Releases Statement” which achieved just under one million engagements on the social network. This shows the scale of the ‘fake news problem’, and the reason for Google and Facebook’s crackdowns. Both platforms have shown themselves to be taking an active role in combatting this widespread issue, but these steps won’t eradicate the problem entirely. Google may need to rethink its search algorithm to ensure fake stories don’t make it to the top of the page, and Facebook needs to widen its preventative measures to cover non-promoted posts as well – otherwise stories, such as the one mentioned above, could continue to get hundreds of thousands of impressions, and influence voters’ decisions.
Instagram launches live-streaming. Following Facebook’s promising lead, Instagram has launched Live streaming in Instagram Stories. Currently, the videos are only available to watch when the broadcaster is live, after which the stream vanishes, but – as with Facebook Live and Periscope streams – this is likely to change. Users can set up notifications for when an account they follow is live streaming, or else they can see in the Stories bar above their feed or visit the live video section in the ‘Explore’ tab. Live video is on the rise; 78% of people watch videos online every week, and the live aspect of streaming encourages engagement and embodies the immediacy of social media.
Google now shows real-time information about how busy a retailer or restaurant is. During the mayhem of Black Friday, shoppers probably relied upon Google’s Popular Times feature, which was introduced in July 2015 and shows the busiest times of day for businesses (including shops, bars and restaurants). This has now been expanded to include real-time data, creating a live feed of how busy a particular place is. The new ‘Live’ tag shows how busy the location is at that moment in time; this also shows as a red bar overlaid on top of the regular blue bar. Popular Times uses anonymised location data from Google’s users, and creates an average rate of popularity over the past few weeks. When viewing the information, users have the option to say if it is correct or not.
Facebook allows businesses to target users who’ve engaged with their page. In a drive to foster longer-term relationships between users, Facebook has added a new targeting option to its custom audiences that lets users share their content with others who have previously engaged with their page. Facebook’s new option specifies that this will include “everyone who visited your Page or engaged with your Page’s content or ads on Facebook or Messenger”. This includes users who have engaged with content up to a year ago (unlike other custom audiences, which goes back 180 days), as well as people who clicked any call-to-action button, those who sent a message to a Page, and those who shared a Page or any post on it.
LinkedIn rolls out global audience insights. LinkedIn announced that it is launching audience insights on its mobile application – soon to be followed by desktop. Users can now see real-time insights on who’s read their posts, the companies they work for, job titles, locations, and how they discovered users’ content. It will now be possible to have a far better understanding of your audience, helping tailor strategies for the future and advise on the best content to share. Not only will this new insights feature help users plan their future content, but it will also give a simple and effective entry point to connecting with people relevant in the industry, starting conversations around topics that the user is already known to be interested in.
A single inbox for Facebook, Messenger and Instagram. Millions of businesses use Facebook, its Messenger app, and Instagram to interact with their customers online. Taking this into account, Facebook launched a single inbox for all three channels so that businesses have an easier way to manage their communications. This single app means users can respond to all enquiries received through the three platforms, and means that none of the three is likely to get left behind. Using this inbox, users can reply to Facebook comments, visitor posts, reviews, messages and Instagram comments – all directly from the inbox. If needed, clicking on the user’s name will show their publicly available profile and any previous interactions, allowing for more personalised communications. The single inbox will be rolled out globally in the next few weeks, to users who have the Pages Manager mobile app.
Facebook nurtures business influencers. As influencer marketing continues to grow in popularity, it’s no surprise that more and more social media users want to jump on the bandwagon and become influencers themselves. With this in mind, Facebook introduced a number of new resources for potential influencers, including a 36 page guide. The Facebook for Business Influencers Guide contains information on Facebook as a Leadership Platform, details about Facebook Live and Facebook Mentions, as well as guides for Notes and 360-degree video. The guide contains information intended to educate those working to become influencers, and give businesses the materials and best practices that will let them fully understand how best to use the platform. This move further emphasises Facebook’s focus on business use.
Facebook and LinkedIn now allow for sponsored private messages. Sponsored content is no longer just for the public domain on social media. Facebook now allows brands use sponsored posts in Messenger; in Facebook’s Messenger app, advertisers are able to send messages to users. Along the same lines, LinkedIn’s Sponsored Mail is now available to all marketers through the network’s Campaign Manager. With it, users can personalise their messages, include a call-to-action button on both mobile and desktop, and make use of LinkedIn’s real-time delivery so that the message is only delivered when the member is active on the platform. These developments show that advertising is transcending the traditional newsfeed and that, with increased targeting of ads, it is actually becoming far more personal as well.
Written by Harriet Chamberlain, Head of Digital (@HLChamberlain)