Tag Archives: Social Media Today

Pinterest has announced the launch of its updated Pinterest Business Community platform, which aims to facilitate discussion about Pinterest tactics, and other business tips, among Pinterest users. The platform includes links to both help and advice guides to help maximize your Pin presence. It also includes case studies on successful Pin campaigns, and a community notice board where you can contribute to Pin-related discussion. You can sign-up to contribute with your Pinterest business profile – follow the links through, log into Pinterest, and you can then customize your avatar and dive into the conversation. The initiative is not entirely new. Based on the conversations on the notice board, some users […]

After announcing its upcoming virtual graduation event last month, Facebook has now unveiled the full program of events, along with the celebrity presenters that will be on hand to help toast the Class of 2020. As explained by Facebook: “Mindy Kaling and B.J. Novak will co-host our multi-hour commencement broadcast #Graduation2020: Facebook and Instagram Celebrate the Class of 2020, on May 15 at 11AM PT/2PM ET. Today we are announcing an introduction by Sheryl Sandberg to a commencement address from Oprah Winfrey and a performance from Miley Cyrus of her hit song, “The Climb.” Awkwafina, Jennifer Garner, Lil Nas X and Simone Biles will offer words of wisdom for the Class of 2020.” While students are not able to […]

With COVID-19 misinformation continuing to circulate through social media platforms, Twitter has announced some new measures to help slow the spread of falsehoods, including a new label to alert users to potentially harmful COVID-19 misinformation. As explained by Twitter: “During active conversations about disputed issues, it can be helpful to see additional context from trusted sources. Earlier this year, we introduced a new label for Tweets containing synthetic and manipulated media. Similar labels will now appear on Tweets containing potentially harmful, misleading information related to COVID-19. This will also apply to Tweets sent before today.” The tags do indeed look similar to Twitter’s ‘Manipulated media’ alerts, which the platform added back […]

Facebook has unveiled a new set of features to support SMBs impacted by COVID-19, including a ‘Support Small Business’ sticker for Instagram and an update to Messenger to help streamline direct response. Here’s what’s been announced: First off, Facebook is rolling out a new ‘Support Small Business‘ sticker for Instagram, which includes not only the new sticker itself, but also enables users to share thumbnail images of the latest three Instagram posts from the business that they choose to highlight within their Story. As you can see here, after you’ve selected the ‘Support Small Business’ sticker for your Story, you then enter the Instagram handle for that business. Instagram will then populate […]

The COVID-19 lockdowns have changed… well, pretty much everything about how we live our day-to-day lives at the moment. But one element that has been significantly altered is retail spending, and how we go about planning and buying the products we’ll need while we’re in social isolation. We saw initial rushes on toilet paper (still weird) and hand sanitizer (still ongoing), but those were only part of the broader changes, and other product categories, you would assume, would also now be seeing significant impacts. More people are cooking at home, so grocery sales, you would think, would have increased, while school lunch items are likely down, along with grooming products and clothing, […]

Google has added some new tricks to its Lens visual identification tool, including an option which will enable users to scan in hand-written text, then share it for use across various applications in one-tap. Google originally added the capacity to scan hand-written notes within Lens back in 2017, but this new addition enables users to share that digital text translation across their connected Google surfaces – so you can immediately access your handwritten reminder within Gmail for example. As you can see here, the option is available as ‘Copy to my Computer’ within your Lens sharing options. You can then save your text to another signed-in device with Chrome (both […]

With streaming content consumption soaring during the COVID-19 lockdowns, YouTube is seeing some major shifts in viewing behavior, and it’s now looking to provide new ad options to help marketers tap into these evolving consumption trends. Even before the lockdowns, connected TV viewers were YouTube’s fastest-growing audience segment, as people become more accustomed to watching online content on their big screens. But now, with people seeking more entertainment options while confined to their houses, YouTube’s TV-connected viewing has gone through the roof: Of course, that’s largely to be expected – people arent watching on their phones as much because they’re at home anyway, and can view the same content on a […]

Instagram is testing out some new ways to navigate through your Stories feed in the app, in order to help people find more Stories content that they’re interested in. Reverse engineering expert Jane Manchun Wong posted this example of one of the new tests in action, which would enable users to side the main Stories frame down to reveal the Stories tray at the top of the screen, then switch through to each. Wong also noted that Instagram has tested another variation of the same in the past – which prompted Instagram chief Adam Mosseri to weigh in, confirming that they are in fact testing new options to help people […]

With millions more people using Zoom amid the COVID-19 lockdowns, the platform is, logically, very keen to capitalize on that increased interest. But data security questions have clouded Zoom’s progress, and forced many to re-think their usage of the app. That’s prompted Zoom to take quick action, with its latest update on this front seeing it acquire encrypted messaging platform Keybase as it moves to further refine its back-end security systems. As explained by Zoom: “Since its launch in 2014, Keybase’s team of exceptional engineers has built a secure messaging and file-sharing service leveraging their deep encryption and security expertise. We are excited to integrate Keybase’s team into the Zoom family […]

Given the rapid evolution, and massive impact of COVID-19, on everybody, it’ll come as little surprise to discover that news organizations are seeing significant increases in online engagement at present. But the specifics of that engagement could reveal some valuable insights for your own content approach. This week, Facebook’s CrowdTangle analytics platform has published a new overview of Facebook Page engagement stats from over 2,700 US local news publishers’ during March and the first half of April 2020. And again, while the broader trends are as you might expect, the detail is interesting to note. First off, CrowdTangle says that local news pages saw a big spike in interest as COVID-19 cases began […]