Welcome to this week’s Social Marketing Cluster Facts! Every week we dig into the social media marketing news scene and uncover the goods. What’s up this week?
Facebook sends its users to Messenger, Instagram rolls out its new feed and Pinterest goes from pinning to saving. Watch SMCF!Â
Transcript:
It’s coming — Facebook is phasing out its mobile web version and will soon be forcing users to install a separate app to access Facebook Messenger. The real reason behind the move? Advertising. The new platform will give marketers the opportunity to advertise in messenger, with content relevant to the user.
Pinterest changed the “Pin it” button to the word “Save” internationally. Why? The word save is more globally universal and has a more positive connotation globally.
Snapchat just passed up Twitter with daily active users and now has snapped up Seene, a startup that allows users to make 3D selfies. According to TechCrunch, the accusation was made a few months ago but has been kept quiet until now. Speculating of how Snapchat may use the new technology includes: advanced lenses, a new 3D photo format, advanced augmented reality, and potentially future work in virtual reality. While its unclear what exactly Snapchat will do with the new tech and team, it’s clear they are focused on continually bringing new and exciting features to the platform.
Twitter announced that marketers can now serve pre-roll ads programmatically in front of premium content from top digital publishers. On top of that, they have begun testing promoted tweet carousel ads in which multiple tweets can be combined into a single ad. The tweets can include videos, images, text from their own account with permission from other creators. You can get the details on both of these announcements on Twitter’s blog.
Instagram started rolling its algorithmic based feed. Many people are pretty damn upset over this change. Personally, I am (in the most first-world-problem way), VERY upset by this change. Which brings me to a new segment we’re calling: TRASH TALK. Of all things to change, why would you change the unique INSTANT part of your platform? “Oh, well you liked 5 pictures of shoes last week, so… uh… here’s 10 posts in a row about shoes!” NO, INSTAGRAM. THAT’S WHAT I WANTED LAST WEEK. THAT IS NOT WHAT I WANT RIGHT NOW. In this… INSTANCE, I want to see my brother-in-law’s dog photo he posted 5 minutes ago. BUT NO, I CAN’T because YOU don’t think that’s what I want. Well, INSTAgram. You’re wrong. You’re so wrong. INSTAgram. INSTANT. You might as well drop that part of your name, and just call it Gram, or Picture Pile. or Photo Post. Or something else that makes sense, like Flickr for Cellphones. Don’t fix it if it ain’t broken. However! Instagram claims that people miss 70% of the posts in the current system and this change will hopefully help you see more of what you care about most. So, maybe I should just settle down and accept that Instagram understands what I want to see more than I do.”
