Welcome to this week’s episode of Social Chatter where we cover the latest social media news from this past week.
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!
Watch This Week’s Social Media Updates
Instagram Comment Controls and Anonymous Reporting
In Instagram news, they have launched new features and tools for users.
The new features and tools include the following:
- Instagram comment controls
- Remove Instagram followers from private accounts
- Anonymous reporting for self-injury posts
Instagram Comment Controls
Instagram comment controls will allow you to turn off comments on any post.
To turn off Instagram comments, follow these steps.
- Before you post, tap “advanced settings”
- Select “turn off commenting”
When you post photos or videos, commenting will be disabled on that post.
Instagram comment controls will be available in the coming weeks.
Why Instagram Comment Controls Matter
Sometimes you don’t want people to comment on your Instagram posts.
With this new feature, you can be selective about which posts you use comment controls on.
Overall, we like the way that this was implemented.
Fast, easy, and it gives your business better control over commenting on your posts.
Remove Instagram Followers From Private Accounts
Also this week, Instagram rolled out the ability to remove followers from private accounts.
Previously, you could add people to your private Instagram account, but you could not remove them.
Now if your account is private, you can tap on a name and remove followers by tapping on the “…” menu.
The person will be removed and they will not be notified that you removed them.
Anonymous Reporting for Self-Injury Posts on Instagram
One last pieces of Instagram news this week is the addition of a feature to report self-injury posts.
A lot of times, people don’t feel comfortable reporting posts to Instagram because they fear that someone will know it was them.
You will now be able to anonymously report self-injury posts.
When you report someone who might be trying to injure themselves, Instagram will connect that person with organizations that can help them.
You can read more about Instagram’s new commenting tool and other features here.
Facebook Targeting Expansion
In Facebook news, they have started rolling out Facebook targeting expansion.
What Facebook targeting expansion does is it gives you the opportunity to expand your target audience if Facebook thinks doing so will help improve your results.
Right now, Facebook targeting expansion is available when you are using “conversions on your website” or “get installs on your app” when running Facebook Ads.
Targeting expansion is turned on by default to start.
To opt out of the targeting expansion, simply uncheck the box in the ad set creation process.
This is what that looks like.
Why Facebook Targeting Expansion Matters
As a Facebook advertiser, your business stands to benefit from targeting expansion.
Facebook added this feature to help you reach more people and also to get cheaper results.
Here are some additional notes about Facebook targeting expansion to know about.
- Targeting expansion does not affect Custom Audiences
- You are not creating Facebook Lookalike Audiences when you use this option
- People you marked for exclusion are not included
- They only expand targeting if they think it will help
- You cannot check to see if your targeting was expanded or not
- There currently is not a reporting metric to see how effective expanded targeted audiences are
Overall, we love the idea of Facebook expansion targeting since a lot of business owners are running Facebook Ads themselves and might need a little extra help.
To learn more about expansion targeting here.
Pinterest Rotating Showcase
In Pinterest news, they have launched a Pinterest showcase.
The Pinterest rotating showcase is a hand-picked showcase of the best ideas your business has to offer.
The rotating showcase appears at the top of your Pinterest profile so it is the first thing that visitors see.
You can choose up to five boards to feature on your showcase.
Another useful feature for the Pinterest rotating showcase is with “buyable pins.”
If you have any buyable pins to share, you can highlight them in the “shop” slot on your showcase.
Here is an example of the new Pinterest rotating showcase feature.
Why A Pinterest Showcase Matters
The Pinterest showcase feature is an extremely useful feature for businesses who are active on their Pinterest channel.
If you don’t check your Pinterest channel very often or you are struggling to build an audience, when you setup a rotating showcase, this will encourage you to continue to go back to your Pinterest channel and update it.
As a business owner, the new Pinterest rotating showcase feature also gives you the opportunity to monetize your channel because you can now feature “buyable pins” in this section.
If you haven’t put much time into developing a Pinterest strategy for your business, the new Pinterest showcase feature should give you reason to.
To learn more about the rotating showcase from Pinterest, go here.
Social Media Ad Spending to Outweigh Print Revenue by 2020
Also in social media news this week, a report came out detailing how social media ad revenue would outweigh print revenue by 2020.
According to the article, “the rapid expansion of social media platforms on mobile devices, as well as faster internet connectivity and more sophisticated technology, has triggered a huge shift in the way many people get their news.”
In particular, a few things that stood out to us was the fact that “Zenith Optimedia, predicts global advertising expenditure on social media will account for 20 percent of all internet advertising in 2019, hitting $50 billion and coming in just one percent smaller than newspaper ads. It expects social media to overtake newspapers comfortably by 2020.”
While we expected social media advertising to overtake print media, we didn’t anticipate that in just a few years, the difference would be just one percent smaller.
In addition to their predictions about social media ad spending, they also included the following chart showing which social media channels adults are using to get their news.
Not surprisingly, Facebook ranked #1 followed by YouTube; however, LinkedIn ranked fourth at just 4%.
LinkedIn is supposed to be a more trusted social media channel.
I guess news just isn’t something they are looking for there, despite it being the channel where you would expect the most accurate information to be shared.
Why Social Media Ad Spending Matters
The fact that social media ad spending is close to overtaking print revenue in less than five years shows the power that having a dedicated community that you visit practically every day can have.
If you haven’t yet set an advertising budget for your business to run Facebook Ads, there is no better time like the present to start.
Conversation Starters In LinkedIn Messaging
In LinkedIn news, they have released conversation starters in LinkedIn Messaging.
According to LinkedIn, “we know that reaching out to reconnect, ask for advice or network for potential job opportunities can be intimidating. How do you start a conversation with someone you haven’t spoken to in months?”
Conversation starters are a way to help you break the ice when you are using LinkedIn messaging.
Here are some of the conversation starters that are included in LinkedIn messaging.
- Updates on your connections’ professional activity. Congratulate your connection if they’ve started a new job or celebrated a work anniversary recently. You can also share your thoughts on an article they’ve recently published on LinkedIn.
- Shared experiences. Connect on something you have in common, such as having worked at the same company, joined the same groups, or gone to the same school.
- Shared connections. Build rapport by mentioning someone who you both know.
Why Conversation Starters In LinkedIn Messaging Matter
The new conversation starters in LinkedIn messaging are important because they help make it easier for you to connect with people and build relationships.
Sometimes you don’t know much about a person you met at a conference or event.
Rather than guess, the new conversation starters aim to help identify important topics you can ask someone about.
For example, do you share a number of mutual connections on LinkedIn?
To see how conversation starters in LinkedIn messaging work, watch this video.
You can learn more about conversation starters for LinkedIn here.
Tools
In addition to sharing the latest in social media news from this past week, we also highlighted some great tools and apps to check out.
Thrive
Thrive (iOS | Android) is a mobile app for small business owners that can help you get real-time sales, profitability and social media data so you know exactly how your business is doing at any time.
With the Thrive app, simply connect your accounts and you can get a snapshot of your business.
For example, you can see daily sales and profitability, view a chart showing sales trends and compare your social media channel performance.
Another feature we like about Thrive is that you can log events that impact your business.
This way your business can have a record of improvements on your social media channels or a drop in sales.
Thrive is a free app. You can download it below.
Download ThriveBettr
The next tool we wanted to share with you is called Bettr (iOS).
Bettr is a scheduling and analytics app for Instagram.
With Bettr, you can schedule Instagram photos, add captions and select the time and day for your post.
Bettr will then do the posting for you.
In addition to scheduling your Instagram posts, you can also see Instagram analytics.
This includes seeing who your exact followers are on your Instagram account as well as being able to see which Instagram users interact the most with your content.
Bettr for Instagram is a freemium app. You can download it below.
Download BettrNembol
The last tool we wanted to share this week is called Nembol (iOS | Android).
Nembol is a mobile app that can help your business publish products to multiple social media channels and websites at once!
Here is a list of the major places you can publish to from Nembol.
- Amazon
- Shopify
- Tumblr
- Various POS systems
- And more
The Nembol app is free.
As a business owner, it could take you hours to add your products to many of these sites.
With Nembol, you can start selling on your social media channels and other websites in minutes.
The Nembol app is free. You can download it below.
When listing your products on some of the websites, they charge a low one-time fee.
Download NembolWrap-up
That’s it for this week’s episode of Social Chatter.
Be sure to tune-in to our next episode of Social Chatter to find out what’s new in social media!
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.
