Welcome back to Spark Social Report by Spark Growth, your weekly source for social media updates! This week, Instagram added moderation features to live videos, Pinterest announced a new shopping feature called “Your Shop,” and LinkedIn added new ways to manage your inbox and feed. Continue reading for more updates across social media from this week!
Digital Marketing Trends
YouTube’s Algorithm Explained
How does the YouTube algorithm work? Rachel Alves, a product manager for YouTube’s recommendation system, posted a video on the YouTube Creator Insider account to help answer this elusive question by answering creator questions.
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Here is a summary of some key takeaways from the video:
YouTube has never used information about how many videos a channel uploads to determine recommendations. Instead, the algorithm uses a viewer’s watch history and frequency to determine the likelihood of a video being recommended. Building an audience that will return to your videos and spend time watching them is more important than the frequency of your uploads.
Trending topics and searches do have more competition. Still, there is also high audience demand and interest for content about trending topics. But, if the topic only has fleeting interest or doesn’t align with your regular content, viewers may be less likely to become a reoccurring audience, which is valued over a video’s view count.
The system tries to match users with videos that they are most likely to watch.
Deleting comments from videos does not hurt the engagement rates of videos. Rather, good comments indicate a viewer’s satisfaction with the content they are consuming. Engagement rate is determined through clicks, watch time, and the amount of video watched.
Moderators for Instagram Live
Instagram is launching a new feature for streamers on the platform to assign other Instagram users as moderators to their livestreams. The designated moderator will be given the ability to report comments, remove viewers of the livestream, and turn off the ability for specific users to comment. This update should help add additional security to livestreams as moderators can identify and mitigate harmful and offensive behavior while the streamer focuses on the content of their stream.
Moderators can be added to livestreams through the menu icon in the comment bar, allowing the streamer to search for a specific user or pick from a list of viewers suggested by Instagram.
Streamers + Mods = Dynamic Duo ❤️
We’re launching Live Moderator on Instagram Live, where creators can assign a mod and give them the power to:
✅ Report comments
✅ Remove viewers from Live
✅ Turn off comments for a viewer pic.twitter.com/S9j7s4dInB— Instagram (@instagram) March 11, 2022
Family Center and Parental Supervision Tools
Meta announced the new Family Center, a place for parents to oversee their children’s account activity across Meta’s various platforms.
With this announcement, supervision tools were launched on Instagram for U.S.-based users. Parents and guardians will have access to data about how much time their children spend on Instagram as well as the ability to set time limits for the app. They can also be notified if their teen reports an account, and receive updates about who their teen follows and who follows their teen.
These features will need to be initiated through the teen’s account for now, with options for parents to initiate coming in June. The full set of features will be rolled out globally in the coming months.
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Simplified “Latest Tweets” Timeline Pinning
Twitter has reversed an update that it launched late last week that made the “Home Feed,” an algorithmically ordered version of the timeline, the default feed. This update pushed the reverse-chronological feed that users have become accustomed to into a separate tab.
After receiving significant criticism, Twitter returned to its default reverse-chronological timeline, removing the tabbed experience for now while continuing to explore new options for the timeline.
We heard you –– some of you always want to see latest Tweets first. We've switched the timeline back and removed the tabbed experience for now while we explore other options. https://t.co/euVcPr9ij6
— Support (@Support) March 14, 2022
Working on Additional Monetization Options- Tweet Awards
Jane Manchu Wong, a reverse engineering expert, tweeted an image of a new award option Twitter may be working on implementing into the platform.
Twitter is working on Tweet Awards pic.twitter.com/4b8MSeIWNh
— Jane Manchun Wong (@wongmjane) March 11, 2022
Though it is currently unclear exactly how this feature will work, it may serve as a new way to donate to creators on Twitter. Other platforms such as Facebook, YouTube, and TikTok already have similar gifting options that act as a means of creator monetization, typically rewarding specific posts rather than the account overall. This feature may potentially act the same as the gifting options we are used to seeing on other platforms.
New Shopping and Advertising Updates Announced at “Pinterest Presents” Event
Pinterest announced a variety of new updates for the platform during its “Pinterest Presents” event last week.
Among these announcements were key new features. The new “Your Shop” feature is a personalized shopping experience embedded within the app, allowing users to browse, show, and buy items that are generated based on the user’s activity and preferences.
Along with “Your Shop” is a new integrated in-app checkout option for Shopify listings and a new Shopping API for merchants to upload their catalogs to the platform more easily.
“Your Shop” is currently in a closed beta, exclusive to select U.S. users. The feature launches country-wide later this year. The integrated checkout option is also in beta for select U.S. merchants.
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New Option for Creators to Export “Idea Pins”
Pinners can now export their “Idea Pins” to share them across other social media platforms.
The update includes options to share directly to Facebook Stories and Instagram Stories and an option to download the content directly to a mobile device, which then can be uploaded anywhere. The downloaded Idea Pin will feature a watermark that attributes the content to the user’s Pinterest username.
Idea Pins are not just video content. Rather, they mix static images and video with annotations like a “Story” that we are used to seeing on other platforms. Sharing and downloading Idea Pins will automatically stitch together each element and add a new ending card with the same content as the watermark.
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Snapchat
New “Custom Landmarkers” Feature
Snapchat is launching a “Custom Landmarkers” feature that will allow creators to make AR (augmented reality) experiences for real-world locations such as statues and storefronts. Landmarkers will be discoverable through Snapcodes placed at the landmark locations or through the creator’s profile.
The new feature is part of Snapchat’s plan to advance its AR experiences. Creators who received early access to the feature have already created experiences in cities across the U.S., such as New York City and Los Angeles.
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New “Outfit Sharing” Feature for Bitmojis
Snapchat users can now share or receive Bitmojis outfits with their friends with a new “Outfit Sharing” feature. Tapping the new “Share Outfit” button sends the outfit through Chat Message, allowing the recipient to try the outfit on their Bitmoji.
The feature is currently available on iOS and is rolling out to Android users soon.
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Updated “Creator Stats” Dashboard
Making a return after being disabled three years ago, Reddit has brought back a new and improved “Creator Stats” feature.
Activating after a post receives ten views, metrics detailing the post’s performance will be available for 45 days to both the original posters and the moderators of the posted community. These metrics include total post views, upvote rate, community karma earned, and total shares of the post.
This update aims to help Reddit users understand what posts will help grow their communities by understanding how the post performed.
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That wraps up this week’s social media updates! Be sure to follow us on Twitter for more of the latest digital marketing news.
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