Welcome to this week's episode of Social Chatter, your weekly social media marketing talk show where we cover the latest social media news from this past week.
As a reminder, each episode of Social Chatter is available as a blog post or video.
Let's see what's new in social media this week with your hosts, Christian Karasiewicz and Nick Rishwain.
We're also joined by this week's special guest, Danica Woolley.
Watch This Week's Social Media Updates
Schedule Facebook Posts In Groups
In Facebook news, you can schedule Facebook Group posts.
Why Scheduling Facebook Group Posts Matters For Your Business
It's no secret, running a Facebook Group can be time-consuming.
This week, Facebook is making it a little easier for businesses running Facebook Groups.
Now, you have the ability to schedule Facebook Group posts.
When you go to write a post in a Group that you admin, you should see a new clock icon next to the post button.
This will bring up a prompt to select a date and time when to schedule your Facebook Group posts for.
Here's how to schedule Facebook Group posts.
Remember, while you can schedule your posts ahead of time, this doesn't mean you don't have to engage.
You'll still want to make time to connect with your Group members.
Facebook Custom Audiences From Instagram Business Profile Engagement
This week, we heard that Facebook was testing custom audiences based on engagement with Instagram business profiles.
Why Scheduling Facebook Group Posts Matters For Your Business
This is great news because with this type of custom audience, you'll be able to create a list of people who have interacted with you Instagram business profile.
You can then retarget them with Facebook Ads.
Right now, not everyone has access to this.
You can check by going into Facebook Ads Manager and to try and create a custom audience.
If you have this feature, you will see the following.
You can read more about this announcement here.
Send Messages From Facebook Page Posts to Messenger
Also in Facebook news this week, you can send Messenger messages directly from Facebook Page posts.
Why Sending Messages From Facebook Page Posts to Messenger Matters For Your Business
The main reason the ability to send messages from Facebook Page posts matters is because it makes it a seamless transaction for customers and fans to reach you.
Previously, if you wanted to send a Page a private message, this required additional clicks.
Now, the Page can encourage others to send them a message in Messenger by enabling this feature on specific posts they choose.
This is what the Messenger button looks like on a Facebook Page post.
When someone clicks on the button, they are prompted to enter their message.
The Facebook Page will then get notified that they have a new message in Messenger.
As a business, you may want to consider turning on the Messenger feature if you're posting something where customers may want to private message you.
For example, if it's something regarding which level an online course might be for.
Some people don't feel comfortable asking these questions in public because it makes them look like a total beginner.
If you would like to try out this new message feature on Facebook Page posts, go here to send us a message.
Snapchat Launches First Daily News Show
In Snapchat news, they have debuted their first daily news show.
Why A Daily News Show On Snapchat Matters For Your Business
NBC News has debuted its first daily news show for Snapchat.
The show is called Stay Tuned.
Their show will air in the morning and afternoon on weekdays.
On the weekend, you'll get one episode or is that Snapisode?
While they plan to primarily focus on politics and international news, we anticipate other businesses to begin experimenting with their own daily show on Snapchat.
If you would like to check out Stay Tuned on Snapchat, you can scan their snapcode below.
To read more about the new NBC News show on Snapchat here.
WordPress.com Adds Social Media Post Scheduling
In WordPress news, they have added the ability to schedule social media posts.
Why WordPress.com Social Media Post Scheduling Matters For Your Business
This week, WordPress.com added an elegant way to schedule social media posts from within their dashboard.
If you run a WordPress.com blog (this is one which WordPress hosts and not you), you were probably using tools such as the fantastic Smarter Queue, Hootsuite or Buffer to schedule out your social media posts.
As a new business though, these tools can be very costly if you're just getting started.
If you have a WordPress.com account, here are the advanced features they are adding for scheduling social media posts.
- Resurface older "evergreen" posts to share them to your newer followers.
- Plan your social media posts in bulk to save time.
- Craft messages specifically to fit the profile or network where you are posting.
- Preview upcoming tweets, Facebook posts, or LinkedIn updates.
- See the previous shares of the post.
To use this new feature to schedule your WordPress.com posts to your social media channels, you will need to be using their Business and Premium plans.
You can find the new advanced social media sharing options under the "share" button in the dashboard.
You can read the announcement about WordPress.com social media post scheduling in this article.
New Instagram API Features
In Instagram news, they are adding new Instagram API features.
Why New Instagram API Features Matter For Your Business
Instagram is announcing a number of new API features to help your business.
In an effort to "support the evolving needs of businesses and help them manage their organic presence more effectively by upgrading to Facebook's Graph API," they are rolling our the following features.
Instagram Insights
First up, they want to make it easier for businesses to get access to Instagram Insights not just from within the Instagram app.
By adding access to Instagram Insights using their API, this will help third-party tools improve on the metrics they share with businesses for organic content.
Instagram Comment Moderation
Next, Instagram is adding new features for comment moderation.
This includes the ability to hide comments or toggle them on and off.
Businesses will have more flexibility now to moderate comments on Instagram.
One thing to note about new Instagram API features is this.
In order to access them, businesses will need have an here.
According to Instagram, businesses will "be required to use Facebook Login when giving permission to third party tools to utilize these features."
If your business doesn't want to make these changes, you can continue using the old version of the Instagram API, but will not get access to the new Instagram API features.
You can read more about the new Instagram API updates here.
Tools
In addition to sharing the latest news from this past week, we also highlighted some great social media tools and apps for you to check out.
Bricks Camera
The first tool that we have discovered this week is called Bricks Camera (iOS).
Would you like to give your brands logo or your photos that you share a unique look?
With Bricks Camera, you can take photos, videos and GIFs and pixelate them to give them a unique look.
In a time where everyone is utilizing the same branding, you have to have a way for yours to stand out.
With Bricks Camera, you can create a unique photo that you share on your social media channels that gives your content a distinct look.
We like to compare it to an 8-bit video game.
As a business, you may want to experiment with this app from time-to-time.
For example, try running a contest on your social media channels.
You could share a photo of a new product that is heavily pixelated using Bricks Camera.
Encourage your fans and customers to submit their guesses about the photo and ask them to check back at the end of the week to see the unveiling.
Bricks Camera is available as a free download.
You can download it from the link below.
Download Bricks CameraPromoRepublic
The second tool that we have for you this week is called PromoRepublic (iOS).
PromoRepublic is an app for creating photos of your products and adding catchy stickers to them.
Here is an example of a product photo made using PromoRepublic.
PromoRepublic is available as a free app.
You can download it from the link below.
Download PromoRepublicWrap-up
That's it for this week's show!
To watch next week's episode of Social Chatter, your weekly social media marketing talk show, tune-in to our Facebook Page to find out what's new in social media news!
If you have any questions about of the social media news or tools that were mentioned this week, please share them with us on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or in the comments below.
