What’s Good in Social — May 2018
Published in
4 min readMay 31, 2018
You may have noticed that I’ve been toying around with different cadences when it comes to writing these. Plus, I’ve also toyed around with the name to find something that fits me, not what I think people want to read. So, with my new “agile” strategy I am moving this to a monthly basis. This will allow me to write about individual stories on social while directing back to these articles, AND provide these on a more consistent basis.
Hey “procrastination”… #Checkmate.
TRENDS OF THE MONTH
- GDPR: Whether you’ve heard of GDPR or not, you’ve definitely received an email from a publication you’re subscribed to about their data policy. You have the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) to thank for that. The European Union’s new data privacy law is making its way to the US. (CNN Tech)
PLATFORM NEWS
- Here Come the Ads: Facebook Stories is now boasting about 150 million daily active users. Sure enough, here come the f****** ads… Don’t get me wrong, I love my industry, but sometimes you just hate ads in certain places. (Techcrunch)
- Pairing Content Creators and Marketers: News leaked that Facebook is testing a search engine that will allow marketers to search on their platform for creators based on certain parameters. (Tech Crunch)
- AR Based Experiences in Messenger: Brands are starting to be given the opportunity to integrate AR filters within Facebook Messenger. The initial launch brands were ASUS, Kia, Nike, and Sephora. (WeRSM)
- Action Buttons: Businesses are starting to see several action buttons on their page which will make it easier to do business. The first set rolling out are buy/get tickets, start order, book, and reserve. Nothing in here for me to use just yet, but in due time *rubs hands like Birdman*. (Adweek)
- Crossposting: Instagram is allowing users to post directly to their Story from other apps such as Spotify and Go Pro. No more screenshotting and uploading just to type “Mood” over a Drake track that I’m listening to. (Instagram)
- Video Chat: Another app joining the video trend. Instagram is rolling out video chat between groups of friends as a means to provide users another way to connect within the app. (TechCrunch)
- Music Stickers: When users went digging through Instagram’s code on Android, they discovered something that alluded to users being able to add music to their posts. (BGR)
- In-App Payments: A new feature began to appear for a portion of users where they could add their debit/credit card information. This would allow them to then make purchases directly in the app. Honestly, I’m not surprised at all. It was only a matter of time. (The Verge)
- Mute Button: While you would think one would simply just unfollow someone if they don’t want to see their content anymore, sometimes Aunt Judy just isn’t that understanding. Thankfully, Instagram is testing an option to mute accounts that you follow. (WeRSM)
- Organic Posts Can Become Ads: It’s about time! A new feature will (finally) allow advertisers to convert organic posts into ads. It’s expected to roll out fully to all by mid-June. (WeRSM)
- Changes for the Political Realm: Twitter is trying to learn from Facebook’s mistakes by getting ahead of potential issues that could arise in the upcoming political season. Candidate’s profile pages will start to display labels identifying them on their profile, on tweets, and RTs both on and off (when embedded) the site. (Marketing Land)
Snapchat
- Sound-Activated Lens: Lenses have been something that users have gravitated to on Snapchat since the (overused) puppy ears/tongue. Hell, even the barfing rainbow was addicting. Now, Snapchat continues to roll out cool sh*t for their lenses by introducing Lenses that react to sound. (Engadget)
- Accelerator Launch: Looks like Snap is looking to expand their offering by getting into investing in startups/creators. Snap Inc. is launching Yellow, which will invest $150k into 10 different startups or creators this fall. (Recode)
- Redesigning the Redesign: The people have spoken. Snapchat rolled back their redesign after a petition (signed by 1.2 million people) and backlash from users. (The Verge)
- Unskippable Ads Are Coming: F***. (WeRSM)
