Instagram takes a hands-on approach to photos, Twitter lands a 360 and YouTube pairs brands with creators for episodic videos. Want more? Watch Social Marketing Cluster Facts!
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Between the Christmas dinner coma and the New Year’s Eve bash, Twitter introduced live 360. When you see the LIVE 360 badge on Twitter or Periscope you can now immerse yourself in the experience and see more by moving your phone or swiping the screen. Everyone can watch live 360 videos, but only select partners can go live.
Snapchat acquired an ad tech company called Flite, an augmented reality startup Cimagine Media, and has partnered with Uber to provide custom filters that only work during your ride. What’s more important to marketers? Snapchat is using machine learning to improve ad targeting and allow marketers to select their main goal. The new Goal-Based Bidding (GBB) uses machine learning to ID which users are most likely to swipe a certain type of ad. Marketers can set a cost per swipe value and then let the machine auto-optimize delivery and bidding. GBB is available through Snapchat’s API.
It’s not all good news for Snapchat, though. They’ve gotten themselves in some hot water with an ex-employee. Anthony Pompliano alleges that “Snapchat fraudulently induced Pompliano away from Facebook to run Snapchat’s new user growth and engagement team by falsely representing to him, among other things, the company’s growth. Snapchat claims: “We’ve reviewed the complaint. It has no merit. It is totally made up by a disgruntled former employee.” We’ll keep an eye on this one and keep you in the loop.
Facebook is aiming to increase advertising revenue in Southeast Asia. Half of Facebook’s revenue now comes from the US and Canada, despite the countries making up just 13 percent of the social network’s user base. To capitalize on untapped markets, Facebook is growing its advertising on Instagram and monetizing Messenger and WhatsApp. Why Southeast Asia? More than 30 percent of online commerce in that area occurs through social media.
We want to take a moment to applaud Chevrolet on its recent Facebook advertising campaign. The New Roads campaign incorporates 360 video, Messenger and Canvas to showcase storytelling at its finest. The campaign follows five individuals as they set out to conquer amazing personal goals in the New Year. After rolling out the produced video, Chevrolet also launched 360 videos from the individuals themselves, providing a glimpse into their world — their hopes, their dreams and their fears. Yet it didn’t stop there. The campaign is harnessing viewers’ inspiration through Chevrolet Co-Partner, a chatbot that lives inside Messenger and allows any user to encourage and share tips with any one of the five individuals. Chevrolet will take a journalistic approach throughout the year, following each individual and sharing their ongoing story through Facebook Canvas. The campaign will wrap up on March 1, hopefully with a celebration of the individuals’ accomplishments.
When you think of fake news, you probably think of Facebook. Why not LinkedIn… ? The professional social network took a bit of a stab at Facebook, claiming there’s one main difference that separates the credibility of news that appears on the two platforms…humans. While Facebook laid off its human editors last year, LinkedIn still employs a team throughout the world that takes a hands-on approach. Huh, humans…
YouTube is pairing content creators with major brand names to help create ‘episodic content’ for their company’s portfolio. The project is reported to be experimental, and that they will be following a “test-and-learn” approach. While this seems all fine and dandy, it makes me wonder. With more brands making more brand-promoted content, how will this affect YouTube as a whole? Will I be bombarded with questions like, “OMG, did you catch last night’s episode of The Wal-Mart Diaries?” or “What season of Mountain Dew are you on?”
The Instacommunity hit a 600-million-Instagrammers milestone, introduced stickers, some holiday-themed fun and, are you sitting down, HANDS-FREE recording. NOW you can record a video without holding the record button, and they didn’t even copy it from Snapchat.
Sources:
Check out live 360 video on Twitter, @s4l4x, Twitter BlogÂ
Snap has acquired an ad tech company called Flite, @KurtWagner8, Recode
Snap reportedly acquired augmented reality startup Cimagine Media for up to $40 million, @thekenyeung, Venture Beat
Ex-employee sues Snapchat, alleges it misled investors: Hollywood Reporter, Reuters
YouTube Labs pairs brands & agencies with creators to produce platform-relevant content, @amygesenhues, Marketing Land
Why Asia-Pacific Is About to Be Huge for Facebook, @admlvy, The Motley Fool
Ad of the Day: Facebook Creative Shop Built Chevrolet’s New Year’s Ads Around 360 Video, @DaveGian, Adweek
Why Is There No Fake News on LinkedIn? Its Editor Explains, Eric Johnson, Sci-Tech Today
600 Million and Counting, Instagram Blog
New to Instagram Stories: Stickers, Holiday Fun and More, Instagram Blog
