During the Halloween season, social media apps and search engines did something scary – they made changes and updates! Though change can be spooky, most updates are for the best, making work for social media managers and everyday users easier. Catch up on some of the latest news and updates from October below.
Social Media
Musk Cuts Staff, De-lists Twitter from the Stock Exchange on Day 1 as Chief
The deal between Elon Musk and Twitter has been finalized, and the Tesla owner now sits as CEO for the time being. His first order of business was firing top executives including the former CEO and the platform’s head of policy. Next, was to make Twitter private. Musk’s other company, X Holdings, will be buying all of Twitter’s stock, delisting the platform from the New York stock exchange. Twitter shares will no longer trade on public markets and will no longer be listed as an entity. Therefore, the platform will no longer have to provide performance updates which will reduce insight into the platform’s new tools and updates.
TikTok Launches ‘TikTok Academy’ Marketing Education Platform
TikTok is offering free course videos on how TikTok can be used to help marketers. The videos include research data and other information to expand your knowledge of the platform. The active modules also include quizzes to test your understanding. When moving through the courses, users can earn badges which they can proudly display on LinkedIn or websites showing expertise in TikTok marketing. The TikTok Academy will teach you how to maximize marketing efforts and how to improve your TikTok ad performance. As of right now there are only two courses available, “TikTok 101” and “Small Business.”
Meta Lets Brands Search Facebook & Instagram For Stolen Content
Meta is helping brands protect their intellectual property (IP) on Facebook and Instagram by providing updates to their tool called Brand Rights Protection. The upgrade offers better search functionality where brands can now search by image. The new feature allows brands to find posts quickly and easily on Facebook and Instagram that are using that image, which brands can report if their content is being used without the brands permission. The Brands Rights Protection tool allows brands to search for stolen content across ads, posts, shops/marketplace, buy and sell groups, pages, profiles, groups, and accounts. The tool is only available to businesses with registered trademarks, not to the public. To be eligible you need to have an account on business manager, have a registered trademark, the trademark must be active and text-based, or image-based, your business can’t have a history of IP violations, and the applicant must be an employee of the brand or business.
Snapchat Rolls Out More Advanced Video Editing Tools with Director Mode
Snapchat has launched a new feature called “Director Mode” which gives users more powerful video tools. The feature first previewed in April and includes filming and editing tools, which include a green screen, dual cameras, quick edit (trim and splice multiple videos), and camera speed, and more. Snapchat hopes that these fun new tools will entice users to use Spotlight, their competitor to TikTok. Director Mode can be found on the main camera’s toolbar.
Soon You’ll Be Able to Schedule Posts on Instagram
Meta is testing the ability to schedule content to post in the Instagram app. You can create your post like normally, but before your post goes live users will have the ability to select the date and time to post automatically. Social media managers will be able to schedule posts directly in the app, rather than using third-party apps. The feature is still in testing among select users.
Industry News
Google Rolls Out Two New Ways to Analyze Data in Ads Data Hub
Google is launching new ways for marketers and third-party measurement partners to analyze data using Ads Data Hub. They created two designated tools in the Hub, “Ads Data Hub for Marketers” and “Ads Data Hub for Measurement Partners.” This will provide faster access to the insights that both parties are looking for, whether that is observing a customer’s path to purchase or measuring video viewability and audience reach. Additionally, Google is expanding measurement services to enable cross-media solutions for YouTube. This will help track the performance of YouTube campaigns relative to other media channels.