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Welcome to our weekly edition of what’s hot in social media news.
To help you stay up to date with social media, here are some of the news items that caught our attention.
What’s New This Week
Pinterest Rolls Out Buyable Pins: “You’ll start seeing Buyable Pins all over Pinterest: in the home feed, on boards and in search results. If a Pin has a blue price, it means you can buy it.” Buyable pins are available to iOS users in the U.S.
Facebook Updates News Feed Rankings for Video: Facebook updates to the news feed ranking “help people see more of the videos they care about and fewer of the videos they don’t.”
Snapchat Introduces Tap to View and Other New Features: “You no longer have to press and hold the screen to view a Snap or Story: instead, simply Tap to View!” Snapchat also introduced Add Nearby, “a quick way to add a group of friends when you’re all hanging out together” and the ability to “add a selfie to the center of your Snapcode.”
Facebook Includes New Videos Tab in Page Insights: The new Videos tab found in Facebook Page Insights “will enable video publishers to more easily determine the overall performance of their videos.”
Meerkat Launches Embeddable Player for Websites: The embeddable Meerkat player is a way to “empower creators to have control over where their content is displayed and reach their audience wherever they are.”
More social media news worth noting:
Facebook Rolls Out Messenger Payments Throughout the U.S.: “Add your Debit Card and pay anyone on Messenger in a few taps.”
Twitter Pushes Ads to Mobile Users With New Button: “Twitter’s latest push to monetize its service has led to the rollout of a new Twitter Ads button, which is now prominently appearing on user profile pages on both the iOS and Android client applications.”
Facebook Announces New Pricing Option for Video Ads: “The social networking giant said it will now give advertisers the option of paying for video ads only when they are viewed for at least 10 seconds. Previously, advertisers were charged immediately when ads came into view on users’ screens.”
YouTube Brings 60fps Video to iOS and Android: “Given that these video streams were already available on YouTube’s other main platforms, it was only a matter of time before Google brought this feature to mobile, too.”
Medium Rolls Out Password-Free Logins: In an effort to make the sign-in process “as secure and simple to use as possible, across all platforms,” Medium has made it possible to sign in and create an account using only your email address. No password or social logins needed.
Other upcoming social media news worth following:
Facebook Presents Revenue-Sharing Model for Video Ads: Facebook unveiled a plan to “begin sharing ad revenue with video creators, a move designed to attract more polished content and more ads.”
YouTube Previews 10 Upcoming New Features for Creators: YouTube presented 10 new features they’ve been working on “to make YouTube better for creators.” Users “can expect to see some of these features in a matter of weeks” and others will be “rolling out throughout the rest of the year.”
Here are a couple of cool social media tools worth checking out:
Narrow.io: This app helps you build a targeted community of engaged users on Twitter.
TUNE Marketing Console: “A new platform that brings together paid, organic and owned channels all into a single dashboard.”
Weekly Video Tip:
How to Make Sure Your Video Looks Great on Facebook
Some interesting studies to note:
Buffer Data Study: Best Times to Tweet: Analyzing over 4.8 million tweets across 10,000 profiles from October 2010 to March 2015, Buffer determined that on average, tweets sent in the early morning are more likely to receive the most clicks. However, tweets sent in the evenings or late at night tend to receive the most favorites and retweets, on average. Exact times vary by time zone. The study also compares tweet volumes, engagement and clicks throughout the world.
Marketing Pain Points and How to Overcome Them: According to a new survey from Econsultancy and SmartFocus, client-side marketers identify the “major bottleneck presented by IT and web development teams” (54%) as their biggest pain point. This is followed closely by “a lack of time to test and optimize campaigns” (47%) and “desire for a single customer view without the time, budget or IT resources to build one” (42%). The report also offers insights and advice on how these and other challenges have been overcome by other marketing professionals.
Engagement With Brand Content Soars: New data from social analytics firm Shareablee shows that people in the U.S. engaged with brand content 52% more frequently in the 1Q 2015 than during the same time period in 2014. The report also shows that the biggest driver of increased engagement was Instagram, which saw brand fans rise 138%, posts per brand rise 21% and consumer engagement with brand content double to 1.9 million actions per brand. This is more than 20 times the engagement rate of Twitter and nearly three times the rate of Facebook.
Locowise May 2015 Facebook Study: The latest study from Locowise examined 5,000 Facebook pages and measured their growth, reach and engagement results in May 2015. There was an 11% increase in page likes growth and a 103% increase in organic reach per post, but a 58% decrease in engagement per post when compared to April 2015. The report also shows that 43% of brands use Facebook advertising, buying 32% of their total reach.
What do you think? Have you tried Pinterest buyable pins? Please share your comments below.
