What to Know This week in Social Media

I was brain drained yesterday to put up some content. The Influencer Series was a lot of fun to write! I hope you enjoyed it and if you have any questions let me know! There are a few things happening in social that I wanted to cover. But I didn’t have time to write a full post but I have a few things you should know happened this past week.

INSTAGRAM STORIES

Introducing Instagram Stories from Instagram on Vimeo.

Instagram rolled out a service that may look very familiar. They now have stories, which is very similar to SnapChat.  Their official statement is “a new feature that lets you share all the personal moments of your day, not just the ones you want to keep on your profile. As you share multiple photos and videos, they appear together in a slideshow format: your story.”

I would say the stories have been a success for Instagram. I have seen way more Instagram stories than posts on SnapChat. Also, they are kept out of the user experience if you don’t want to see them. Many want to use Instagram for pictures and not quick videos. You can still do this, if however, you want to see stories from people you follow. You will see them at the top of your Instagram Feed. You can watch as many or as few as you want. One trick I learned is if you tap the story you can skip to the next story.

We will give this a much bigger look in the next week or so!

FACEBOOK PAGE REDESIGN

New Facebook page

Facebook quietly rolled out a new page design. There have been rumors since June about this happening. This was a shock to me. I went to a brand page and was like WHAT? Then went to mine to see it was fully rolled out. Some things to note is your avatar no longer overlaps your cover image. It will allow you to create cover art that uses the entire space now. Next is the tabs are gone! Well not really they are now to the right. The good thing is you no longer have to pick and choose which tabs you want to show. They all show on the left

Some things to note is your avatar no longer overlaps your cover image. It will allow you to create cover art that uses the entire space now. Next is the tabs are gone! Well not really they are now to the right. The good thing is you no longer have to pick and choose which tabs you want to show. They all show on the left side bar. The call to action button is now easier to see. The learn more on my Marketing Elements Blog page is more noticeable. The blue button is a good addition.

They also removed ads from pages. Meaning there are no more ads showing on the right side of pages. It’s devoted entirely to the page. I found it odd that this was rolled out before personal pages. Usually, it goes from user profiles to pages. It could mean a divergence in user and brand experience now.

FACEBOOK AD PREFERENCES 

ad preferences

Facebook is explaining how they are handling ad blockers and ad preferences. Many people are starting to block ads on desktop and mobile. They are explaining how the ads are served and how you can change your preferences. The official reason is:

When they’re relevant and well-made, ads can be useful, helping us find new products and services and introducing us to new experiences — like an ad that shows you your favorite band is coming to town or an amazing airline deal to a tropical vacation. But because ads don’t always work this way, many people have started avoiding certain websites or apps, or using ad blocking software, to stop seeing bad ads. These have been the best options to date.

I will say that Facebook has some great ads. I have purchased products and apps. Clicked to learn more about sites and services. Most of the ads aren’t intrusive and there are quite a few saved in my “saved list.” Its because I don’t have time right then to see what they are offering or I know I don’t need what is offered then but may need it in a few days or weeks.

Here are three things you should know this week!

 

 

Tim is the founder of Element33. A social media agency specializing in education, management and strategy for small businesses. He comes from a traditional marketing agency but has embraced all things digital. He considers himself a marketing nerd and believes that all marketing is tied together. This means no matter what silo you are in, social, email, seach, etc, changes in one will affect the other!

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