We’re back with another week of social media news in Spark Growth’s Spark Social Report! This week, TikTok has imposed a ban on body-shaming ads, and Pinterest has rolled out “Story Pins.” Read the full article to learn more about what’s new on the top social media apps!
TikTok
TikTok has become more popular over the last few years, and more recently, marketers have been using the platform for advertising purposes. With many social media platforms often being inundated with ads that promote harmful weight loss products, however, TikTok has imposed a ban on fasting apps and weight loss supplements related ads. The platform has also put restrictions on ads that promote negative rhetoric around body image. In addition, users can report harmful ads, add comment filters to prevent trolling on their feeds, and even block profiles that engage in negative behavior.
This week, Facebook is implementing a new ad policy where it will be disabling all the ads of eCommerce pages that have low scores. A “low score” is considered 2 or under, and is based on a scale of 0 to 5. Scores are based on surveys of users who have purchased products after they see or click on a Facebook ad. Businesses who are running campaigns for an eCommerce brand who are not aware of or haven’t been keeping track of their Facebook score can double-check their score by clicking this link here.
In an attempt to prevent the spread of misinformation and fake news, Twitter is planning to roll out a feature that prompts the user to read what they’re retweeting before sharing it. This is an effective way to encourage users to actually read the article beforehand as well as becoming aware of its credibility, in case it contains misleading or false information.
https://twitter.com/TwitterComms/status/1309178718456221696
Though WhatsApp already has a “Delete for Me” and “Delete for Everyone” feature, now the platform is experimenting with “Expiring Media.” The new update will allow users to delete any media on someone else’s phone after sending it to them. To enable this feature, the sender can select the “View Once” button when sending the image, video, or GIF. The recipient can only view this message while they are in that specific chat. Once they leave the chat, WhatsApp will notify the user with, “This media will disappear once you leave this chat.” If and when they return to the same chat, the app will notify them saying, “View once photo expired.”
Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been a significant increase in online shopping. Instagram has released various features within the last number of months that cater to this market, and have just released a new guide on how marketers can optimize on Instagram Shops when it comes to reaching potential customers. In the guide, Instagram has explained how to add shopping tags in posts, Stories, and live-streams, as well as how to create Collections using Commerce Manager.
In an effort to offer more opportunities for businesses to find support on its platform, LinkedIn has released new updates to its Marketing Partners Program. The program is aimed at building a community of marketing partners who can help brands foster a more successful presence on LinkedIn. LinkedIn has classified these updates as “new specialties” of the program that businesses can choose from when determining the area of help they need.
The first is Page Management, under which partners can streamline activities across social channels, reducing time needed to maintain an effective publishing strategy. Next is Content & Creative, under which partners will deliver content and creative to brands, such as white papers, videos, and individual posts. Under Audiences, partners can enable brands to bring their own data into Campaign Manager in order to enhance LinkedIn’s native targeting facets. Campaign Management is aimed at testing and optimizing LinkedIn ads, wherein a partner will help a business get started and improve return on ad spend. Lead Generation partners will automatically route leads to the platform of a business’ choice, allowing its sales team to follow up more efficiently. Reporting & ROI partners will build reporting for LinkedIn and other marketing platforms in order to show a holistic view of campaign performance data. Lastly, Insights partners will uncover information businesses need in order to build campaigns for LinkedIn.
Pinterest is all set to join the “Stories” club with its own version called “Story Pins.” Unlike stories on other social networking sites, “Story Pins” will not expire in 24 hours, and can actually be saved to boards for viewing later. Aimed at giving creators a platform to tell visual stories, “Story Pins” increases the interaction between creators and Pinners. Currently, “Story Pins” will only be available to select creators in the U.S., with more countries to follow in the coming months.
Advertisers have been reluctant to promote their brands on Reddit because of past controversies related to its “no filter and free speech” approach. Due to this, Reddit is set to make amends by attempting to build more trust with marketers: the company launched a three-tier ad inventory model that gives brands control over where their ads are placed and who they are targeted at, along with providing updated brand safety measures when running promotional campaigns on Reddit.
The categories include Expanded Inventory, which enables advertisers to explore Reddit’s maximum inventory pool and appear in the same category as the broadest content range; Standard Inventory, which helps marketers prevent their brands from appearing next to objectionable content; and Limited Inventory, which provides businesses with an extra layer of brand safety via a partnership with Oracle Data Cloud’s contextual intelligence tool.
More people are relying on Google Meet than ever before, especially since many companies started working remotely due to the pandemic. Before the pandemic, users were able to conduct uninterrupted virtual meetings at minimal cost, but in April, the company had announced that Google Meet would be free for everyone until September 30, 3020. Given the dependency on video conferencing due to the pandemic, Google has decided to extend the free unlimited (within 24 hours) Meet calls through March 31, 2021. This applies for any users that have a Gmail account.
Additionally, users can now blur the background of their Meet video, and can also see up to 49 people at the same time in the auto and tiled layout options. Google has also announced its noise cancellation feature on Google Meet for Android and iOS, which filters out unwanted background noise for users. As of right now, however, this is only available on mobile devices for G Suite Enterprise and G Suite Enterprise for Education customers.
That’s all for this week’s updates! Be sure to follow Spark Growth on Twitter for more social media-related news!
In the meantime, if your business has transitioned to eCommerce during the pandemic, now is the time to ensure your digital marketing strategy helps achieve your goals.
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