Allison Chaney
Apr 03 2018
We spend hours reviewing articles, posts, and reports to stay up-to-date so you don’t have to. Here are the April 2018 digital marketing news updates to keep you current in performing your job.
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Facebook News Updates
- Facebook has been busy this month dealing with the Cambridge Analytica scandal. In a case where data was initially obtained legitimately, it was not used in compliance with Facebook terms, and rumor are swirling around about how the data was possibly used to influence voters in a US election. This began an uproar of people threatening to #deletefacebook. As we often see, people eventually calmed down a little and we haven’t seen significant numbers of people dropping off of the platform. Now, Facebook is focusing in making your personal data more secure, and making your privacy settings easier to find so you know what you’re consenting to share.
- Facebook suspends Cambridge Analytica and SCL Group from Facebook. Claiming that they were lied to about the use of their data, Facebook has suspended accounts of the violating parties.
- Facebook is Cracking Down on Platform Abuse to help protect the privacy of everyone’s information with changes including restricting the data that is shared with an app and making permissions easier to control.
- Facebook is making Privacy Tools Easier to Find as well, including making controls easier to find, and introducing Access Your Information which allows people to manage the information they post and share. They are even making it easier to download the data you’ve shared with Facebook.
- Facebook is pulling third party targeting data. In the wake of this scandal, Facebook has decided to phase out the use of third party data for ad targeting. This means that data related to purchasing behavior and household income will no longer be available to advertisers. Facebook is doing everything they can to keep users and advertisers from leaving the platform and taking their ad dollars elsewhere. This will affect some advertisers more than others, especially those targeting users based on personas which often use household income and financial data. So, marketers will need to test alternative strategies and targeting options, and allow time for the algorithms to learn about your audience under the new parameters. Custom Audiences and Look A Like Audiences will not be affected, and are still great ways to target your ads to the right audience.
- Facebook’s new Custom Audiences permission tool will require user consent confirmation. While Facebook claims that this change is just a part of their ongoing effort to protect user data, it aligns with the other changes going on at Facebook this month. This new tool is still in development, but if you use or intend to use Custom Audiences, be on the look out for this update, as it will require you to prove in some way that you have consent to use the email addresses that you have in your list.
- Facebook unveils Trip Consideration for travel advertisers. If you are an advertiser in the travel industry, and especially if you are targeting millennials, then this is an update you need to know about! When setting up ads in the Facebook Ads Manager, the option appears with the Conversion campaign type. This allows you to show your content to people who are in the initial stages of looking for a travel destination based on behaviors exhibited on Facebook or Instagram.
Twitter News Updates
- Introducing Timestamps: A New Way to Share Live Videos. Twitter recognized that users were often Tweeting video with a specific time in the video that they want people to watch, so they introduced a new way to share video. Timestamps will allow you to Tweet a video starting from the moment you want them to watch. Users on Twitter have an even shorter attention span than other platforms, so getting to the point quickly is critical.
Snapchat News Updates
- Snapchat bulks up location-based ad targeting & launches in-store analytics tool. Advertisers can now target ads based on a radius around a specific geographic point or a location type. The location based ad filter allows advertisers to show relevant ads based on a user’s location, such as swimsuits for Snapchatters currently at the beach. Radius targeting is another feature that can help advertisers drive foot traffic. With Foot Traffic Insights, stores can track demographic and interest data about Snapchat users who have visited their location. Keep an eye on Snapchat as they launch these new features. Ads may soon be expanded to the map feature.
- Snapchat’s @-tagging test could help brands & influencers build their follower numbers. Users can now tag someone in a Story, which allows the user to click the username and add them directly to their account. This can be a game changer for influencers and brands looking to gain followers.
LinkedIn News Updates
- LinkedIn is rolling out native video advertising & video for Company Pages. Businesses can now run video ads in the news feed as sponsored posts. Since video is still relatively new on the platform, this could be a great way to stop the scroll and capture attention with video. Companies can also now include video on their Company Pages. LinkedIn found that video on a Company Page is 5x’s more likely to start a conversation than other types of content. It’s time to start thinking video on LinkedIn!
Instagram News Updates
- Instagram makes Stories advertising easier with automatic full-screen support. Building multiple creatives for an ad campaign can be time consuming. This update helps advertisers be a little more efficient with their ad creation. If an advertiser has a square or landscape image, Instagram will automatically transform it to fit the full screen.
- Instagram to Show More Recent Posts First. Instagram will start showing more timely posts at the top of the feed. As a marketer, this could affect visibility of your older content, so be sure to create great content frequently, to help you appear at the top of the feed.
- Instagram Adds Support for Hashtags & Profile Links in Bios. Before, these were just entered as text and not clickable. But now, Instagram users can place hashtags and links to other profiles in their bios, and these will become clickable links. Think of the ways you could expand the reach of your brand by linking to your brand page from your personal profile page or that of an influencer.
Pinterest News Updates
Search News Updates
- Google rolls out new version of Keyword Planner Tool. The new version matches the look and feel of the new AdWords experience which might make it a challenge to find your way around if you’re comfortable using the old version. You can still bulk upload keywords, and now you can get a clear snapshot of the plan along with device and location information. In our example, we discovered the top states that are most popular for our keywords, so we might consider doing a training in those locations!
- Inactive AdWords Accounts are Getting Deactivated. If you haven’t spent any money in AdWords in the past 15 months, Google will deactivate your account soon. If you find your account has been deactivated, there is a process for reactivating it.
- Google Adds Title Tags to Image Search Results. We’ve only seen this update on mobile, but with the significant usage of mobile, this is an update you won’t want to ignore. The title tag of your page will appear as a caption to your images that appear in search results. So, as you’re optimizing your images, be sure your title tag of your page is also optimized and relevant to the images on your page. Think of what is going to appear beneath the image and you might come up with some tweaks that make your image more enticing to click.
Bonus!
- WordPress is now being used by 30% of the top 10 million sites on the web. If you’re trying to decide what platform to design your website on, WordPress is probably your best option. And keep an eye out for our upcoming training on Websites to learn everything you need to know about building a website!
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