Check out our round-up of the biggest changes in social media and digital marketing from the last month. Let us do the work for you, we gather the updates, you reap the benefit of having all of them in one place!
We read all of the latest social media news so you don’t have to.
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The top news in social media that we covered this month includes:
Facebook
Testing professional services feature – This service lets you find local businesses based on ratings and reviews. This could be interesting (IF people actually use it) and it would make local business Pages and reviews even more important. Facebook has tried to make business listing more relevant in the past with enhanced search, etc, but they have not been overly successful. We’ll keep our eyes on this and keep you updated.
Facebook videos are embeddable– Could Facebook be getting in on YouTubes turf? Maybe. Facebook launched an embed API which means that Facebook videos can now be embedded on other sites. This is another move in the direction of making Facebook more about videos.
Facebook LIVE gets bigger– Facebook live brings the streaming power of Periscope to Facebook. Verified Pages can now stream live — the streamed event shows up as a notification to fans and is recorded and added to the Timeline after streaming. This is a great way to increase visibility with your fans.
Facebook messenger adds fun new features – This is probably more relevant for personal users vs. businesses, but Messenger has new capabilities including private photo group messaging, fun animations and more. As Messenger becomes more relevant it will likely generate increased business opportunities over time. Also, Facebook announced that Messenger has over 800 Million Users… making messenger one of the biggest social networks.
Facebook Launches Audience Optimizer – This is mostly relevant for content producers, however it allows you to suggest who is likely to be interested in your content. This may be linked to rumors that Facebook will be launching additional newsfeeds to connect you to things you might be interested in.
Facebook Enhances Lead Ads – Facebook enhances their lead ads to provide additional information to drive sign ups. If you haven’t checked out lead ads yet take a look – initial studies show that they are a cost effective way to focus your Facebook advertising budget.
Celebrate New Years with a Secret Emoji – Twitter created a cool feature where if you used the #HappyNewYear a new year emoji would be unlocked and added to the Tweet. While this isn’t mind-blowing it could signal potential future opportunities – imagine if a brand could create/purchase special emojis that are unlocked when you use their hashtag….
Twitter launches conversational promoted Tweets – This is ONLY available with promoted Tweets, but you can now create conversations with Promoted Tweets. This makes Twitter ads even more interactive — if you actually create an ad that people want to interact with.
Is Twitter Lifting the Character Limit – There are rumors that Twitter is lifting the character limit – so instead of 140 characters you could have 10,000 characters. This has not been confirmed. In unrelated (or maybe related?) news a number of top executives recently left Twitter, suggesting changes at the social network.
Pinterest
Pinterest Buyable Pins show price drops– Pinterest is focusing on retail (they announced that Retail and CPG are their focus areas for ads) and Buyable Pins will now feature price drops, making them more relevant for shoppers.
Vine
Vine For You Channel– Vine has created a custom channel for each user populated with Vines they think you’ll love. As Vine continues to try to become the “go-to” place for video consumption this new feature could drive even more users.
Google+
Google+ Adds Features– You thought it was dead, didn’t you? Google is still looking to do SOMETHING with Google+ and make it a relevant community. Google+ added community categories in an attempt to drive user discussions on the platform.
Periscope LIVE from Twitter – You can now watch Periscope live streams directly in Twitter. This potentially makes Periscope even more relevant as you can generate views from both Twitter and Periscope.
