Social Media News – Week of 12/29
It’s amazing to think that 2015 is only a few days away. We’ve had a great year and we’re really looking forward to what the new year will bring. 2014 definitely delivered a lot of developments, especially in the world of social media, so this year we have a resolution for you: stay on top of all of the latest and greatest changes! It’s easy to keep in the loop by checking up on our weekly social media roundups.
Do you upload a lot of photos to Facebook from your phone? You’re not the only one, and Facebook wants to encourage this behavior. It recently introduced auto-enhancing for mobile photo uploads. This means that you won’t necessarily need to use third-party enhancing apps before posting your photo to Facebook; you can now improve your photos right within the Facebook app. This is great for the social media manager on the go!
Speaking of photos, Facebook is also trying to make photos more playful with its new app, “Stickered” for Facebook Messenger. This app allows you to place stickers on top of the images that you are sending in Facebook messages. Stickered also saves these photos to your camera roll, so you can upload your favorites right to your Facebook feed. We have a feeling that this will be great for fun-loving and friendly brands!
Have you noticed your Instagram follower count drop in the past week? It happened to pretty much every user, but don’t worry – this is a good thing! Instagram deleted every spam account, lowering most user’s overall follower counts. While this may seem bad (more followers are always a good thing, right?), this is actually a great move, because now your followers are actual humans who are interested in your brand’s content and are more likely to engage with your posts.
Another thing you may have noticed while on Instagram are five new filters. These filters (called Slumber, Crema, Ludwig, Aden, and Perpetua) are really beautiful and look very similar to the filters found on many third party photo-enhancing apps, such as AfterLight, VSCOcam, and SquareReady. This is the first time in 2 years that Instagram has added new filters, and is a very smart move for the company. Giving the user more options within the app makes the user less likely to use third-party apps – it also makes it easier for users to point, click, and post without ever leaving the app.
Twitter analytics are now available in the iOS app.
Love analytics? We do too! If you’re a social media manager (or just a business looking to benefit from social), you should be looking at analytics all the time. Twitter seems to realize this, because it just made analytics available within the iOS app. We can’t wait to use these, and we’re hoping that the rest of the major players will take note!
Promoted Pins for all! Pinterest just announced that starting on January 1st it will be allowing any and all advertisers to promote a Pin, due to the success of their Promoted Pins beta test round. Pinterest has even announced that there will be specified targeting for these Pins, so be on the lookout for this feature within the next few days!
Google+
Sharing videos on Google+ just got a lot easier with its new auto-enhance option! This new feature is great; now all of the videos you post to Google+ will look fantastic.
Social media should be a big part of your 2015 digital marketing plan, so staying in the loop with these platforms is essential. Keep up with all of the latest and greatest changes by visiting our blog (or social media platforms!) each week for our latest social media roundup.