Tag Archives: Social Media Today

With many people turning to Facebook groups to stay connected and informed amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Facebook has been working to add new group tools and options to help admins provide accurate, timely information, and manage their communities during the crisis. Now, Facebook’s adding a new educational element to this push, with a series of free workshops to provide community managers with key insights and lessons on how to enhance group engagement during the global lockdowns. As per Facebook: “We’re hosting an online event to help community leaders manage their communities during this challenging time. We designed this event to help you engage your members, manage conflict and bring members […]

With everybody locked inside due to the COVID-19 pandemic, streaming video is the order of the day, with video calls on both Messenger and WhatsApp more than doubling over the past month, and group streaming app Zoom seeing massive growth. Multi-participant streaming app Houseparty is also posting huge numbers – as per Bloomberg: “In the past month, Houseparty has seen 50 million signups, [around] 70 times the app’s typical amount in some markets. The company doesn’t disclose total user numbers, but it has been the most-downloaded social networking app in Apple’s U.S. App Store every day since March 20th – ahead of Facebook Inc.’s trio of Facebook, Messenger and WhatsApp – and it […]

YouTube is testing a new ‘Video Chapters’ option that would display creator-submitted descriptions of relevant sections of their videos within the playback timeline along the bottom of the video post. As you can see here, the playback timeline is sectioned into variable chapter lengths, which, when highlighted, expand the specific timeline section and provide a description of what that segment is about. As explained by YouTube Creator Insider host Tom Leung: “It helps viewers with more context and information associated with a particular time in your video – it’s basically making time stamps a little bit more official. [Video chapters] utilize the time stamp data that you publish in your description, […]

Facebook has partnered with the World Health Organization to launch a new chatbot on Messenger which will provide users with accurate, timely info about the COVID-19 pandemic. As explained by Messenger: “The World Health Organization (WHO) has launched an interactive experience on Messenger, with support from Sprinklr, to help provide accurate and timely information on the COVID-19 pandemic. WHO will be leveraging Messenger’s reach to more than 1.3 billion monthly active users who will now be able to ask questions and get quick answers from the WHO’s “Health Alert” interactive service on Messenger, which is free to use.” The new chatbot, which can be accessed via the WHO Facebook Page or […]

Facebook will now provide group admins with the capacity to mute selected group members for up to 28 days, expanding on the existing group muting options. As you can see in this screenshot, posted by social media expert Matt Navarra, group admins will now have two new options for muting individual members – ’14 days’ and ‘ 28 days’. Up till now, group admins have been able to mute selected members for up to a week at a time, but the new options expand that further, giving admins more control over how their groups are managed. When group members are muted, they can still view content in your group, but […]

Pinterest is adding a new set of businesses to its Pinterest Shop showcase, in order to help provide promotion for those impacted by COVID-19, while also aligning with rising trends on the platform. As per Pinterest: “In honor of the 50th anniversary of Earth Day, we’re launching a brand new collection of products from sustainable brands on the Pinterest Shop. The latest curated collection features hundreds of shoppable products (click Pin to go straight to checkout on the retailer’s site) from 21 small and medium-sized businesses.” Originally launched last November, Pinterest’s shop features a collection of trending, shoppable products, hand-picked by Pinterest’s team. The latest additions include a range of eco-friendly, sustainable products […]

We’re living in an unprecedented situation, and no one knows how it’s all going to play out, how long it’s going to take to resolve, and what the full impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic will be. The human impacts are almost too terrible to contemplate, and the economic impacts will be huge. But in amongst this, many businesses are still operating, and are still looking to maintain their revenue, in some capacity, in order to minimize the impacts of the largest global shutdown in history. And while you absolutely do not want to be opportunistic, there are significant opportunities within the current market as a result of the shutdowns which […]

As you’ve no doubt heard and read before in digital marketing circles, video content is a big deal, and you should, wherever possible, be looking to create video to compliment your digital marketing campaigns. Video is the best performing content type on Facebook, Tweets with video see 10x more engagement than those without, LinkedIn users are 20x more likely to share a video on the platform than any other type of post – the list goes on. But while there’s little doubt that video content performs better, actually creating good quality video content isn’t easy – and especially so right now, amid the COVID-19 lockdowns, where organizing a full video shoot is simply […]

There must be something in Facebook’s usage data that indicates a trend towards increased interaction with close connections within its apps – or maybe within other apps that Facebook’s trying to steal away. Last week, Facebook’s experimental NPE team launched a new app called ‘Tuned‘ which is a couple-centric messaging tool where you can share more private engagements. This week, Facebook is doubling down on more intimate communication, with a new app for the Apple Watch called Kit, which aims to help users “keep in touch with those most important to you — without constantly needing to pick up your phone.” As reported by TechCrunch, Kit – which is actually […]

The COVID-19 shutdowns across the world have had a huge impact on business, aside from society more broadly. Millions of people have had to adjust to working from home, some business are totally unable to operate, while many other organizations which are reliant on advertising are still measuring the impacts, which will evolve over time as more events are cancelled, more celebrations are wiped out, and the situation continues to divert things from the norm. In this time, it’s difficult to know what brands should be saying, and what response you should expect. Should you still be trying to advertise and promote amid the unfolding tragedy? With more people online, […]