#SocialSkim: Meet Facebook 'Creator'; Google's Best Social Feature Yet:

This week's 'Skim: Facebook courts video creators away from YouTube with a dedicated app; Google's new social search feature could win over small business from Facebook; Facebook tests total VR experiences within News Feeds; a handy guide to social selling on LinkedIn; where social video's going in 2018; the convincing reason podcast listeners could be your next influencers; seven ways to maximize social media this holiday season; and much more...

Skim to step confidently into the holiday rush!

1. Facebook courts video creators with new app

As part of Facebook's continued push into video, it's launched a new initiative to convert YouTube creators into Facebook fans. The social network launched a standalone mobile app on iOS (Android's soon to come) called Facebook Creator to help creators stream live video, update their Stories, message across Facebook's different platforms, and dive into their videos' performance.

Why not just stick with the main Facebook app? Creator lets producers create custom intros and outros for their Facebook Live streams; it has a feature to take and edit photos before posting them to Stories; and it boasts a unified inbox for comments on Facebook and Instagram and messages from Messenger so you don't have to jump around your phone's home screen to respond to everyone.

2. 'Posts' could be Google's best attempt at social yet

Google sells Posts simply as a new way to share relevant, fresh content with the people who are searching for you, but with 82% of people turning to search engines to get local information, the Internet giant's new social capability could make it more important to small businesses than Facebook.

Posts surface within Google Search and Maps results themselves, and businesses can include images, GIFs, videos, text, titles, start and end dates for events, and call-to-action buttons to serve timely, relevant content to users who are already invested in their search.

Whether for your promotions, specials, events, or product showcases, Google just opened a whole new world of search for local businesses. Will you take advantage?

3. Facebook tests VR experiences within users News Feeds

Your branded Facebook content just got a lot more exciting, and virtual reality really might be the next big thing for 2018. Facebook this week used the release of the upcoming Jumanji film to showcase its new VR 360 experience directly in News Feeds. Users are able to take part in a Jumanji-themed scavenger hunt and roam around the jungle—either with a VR headset or via 360 degree video.

The social network has opened up developer tools so brands can partake in building virtual worlds, and some have already done so—from a USA Today walkthrough of a Kentucky distillery to a tour of the British Museum. Check out how brands have engaged so far.

4. A guide to social selling on LinkedIn

It might be the most important social platform for B2B marketers out there, but taking a clumsy approach to social selling on LinkedIn by treating it like all other social marketing can cause more harm than good. Social selling requires fostering one-on-one relationships, and your success at assisting quality leads down the purchase funnel can be measured with LinkedIn's Social Selling Index performance metric.

From taking your connections off LinkedIn and into the real world, to fully optimizing your profiles, to identifying active LinkedIn users to pitch and using plugins to automate activity where possible, mastering social selling on the platform can create up to 45% more selling opportunities and makes you 51% more likely to hit your quota. Why not take the advice offeredby the Forbes Coaches Council?

5. Everything you need to know about where social video is going for 2018

Video now accounts for 69% of all Internet traffic. And with next-generation 5G wireless networks hitting the market in 2019 and 2020, important trends are shaping up that will undoubtedly affect how your brand approaches social video.

VentureBeat takes an in-depth look at just what you can expect: more six-second ads that tell your story; more advertising on Netflix; more midroll ads, more reliable analytics; more personalization of video ad content; and more mobile video consumption, mobile VR, and more of more.

6. Why podcast listeners could be the next big influencers your brand needs

A new report indicates that podcast super listeners could be the most influential group of tastemakers your brand needs. With over 67 million people tuning into podcasts each month, and super listeners among those rating podcasts just behind national newspapers in terms of trustworthiness (social media came in last), could the listening format be a valuable tool for your business?

Choosing the right message and reaching your super listeners several times is key to courting these influencers, but once that's done, 75% of them do end up taking action. Magnify the endorsements of those ambassadors on social channels, and podcasts could play an integral part in your influencer marketing arsenal.

7. Seven ways to maximize social media this holiday season

November and December mark a rush to the finish line for many businesses as they kick off end-of-year holiday promotions, and social media can be a marketer's and advertiser's best friend in helping achieve their goals.

From defining your wish list, to knowing the people on your nice list, to giving the gift of relevance, and more, a MarketingProfs article offers seven ways to help your brand conquer the holiday rush.

8. We'll wrap with Twitter's new role of policing users' behavior off the social network

Apparently, giving a white supremacist a verified checkmark on Twitter can lead to a lot of headaches. After a row for granting, and then taking away after user backlash, Twitter's blue verified checkmark to the man responsible for organizing the Charlottesville rally, the social network revised its verification guidelines. In having done so, it may cause a lot more backlash in the future.

Twitter's new policy includes the company's right to take away, without notification and at any time, verification based on behaviors on or off Twitter. That's right, Twitter now has to monitor not only what verified accounts of doing on their platform, but also play police for any activities those users partake in offline. That's a huge burden, and we're not sure it's ready for it.

#SocialSkim: Facebook's Yelp-Killer Events App; Snapchat's Coming Algorithm:

This week's Skim: Facebook's new standalone app wraps Yelp, Foursquare, and Facebook Events into one; Snapchat's massive redesign and upcoming algorithm; LinkedIn streamlines Lead Gen Forms for messages; Amazon courts Instagram and Twitter influencers with a commission program; the social app that was just bought by a Chinese startup for nearly $1 billion; why Pinterest just created its own version of QR codes, and how your brand could use them; and much more...

Skim to spend your time wisely!

1. Facebook launches Local, a standalone app to destroy Yelp and Foursquare

What's more credible to a consumer than their friends' and families' endorsements? Not a whole lot. That's what Facebook's banking on its new app that fuses the power of the world's biggest social network with the recommendations of your closest friends.

The social network essentially repurposed its Events, adding bar and restaurant info, to create an app that houses calendar events and listings, a map that lets you see how far you'd have to travel to get to that location or event, ratings and comments from friends and the wider Facebook audience about all the local spots in your neighborhood, the events that people you follow attend, attractions, and more. Your move, Yelp.

2. Massive Snapchat redesign, algorithmic feed set to go live next month

Mark your calendars: Snap Inc.'s set to give Snapchat a major redesign that's aimed to make the app easier to use, as well as introduce an algorithmic feed and new sections that will prioritize where, when, and from whom users see content. And it's coming soon.

That's the big teaser coming straight from the mouth of Snap Inc. CEO Evan Spiegel, and new insights suggest that content from friends will be separate from that of influencers and other public-facing accounts. Moreover, the update would also effectively kill the current Stories and Discover sections of the app. It all goes down on December 4th.

3. LinkedIn improves Lead Gen Forms, aims to make lead generation a cinch

The business-centric social network created Lead Gen Forms that auto-populate professionals' personal details into a contact form of sorts to make it simpler and faster for users interested in new products or services to submit their information to companies. Users love it because it saves time, and companies do because it makes gathering leads easier and it can save them 20 cents per lead.

Now, LinkedIn users can include Lead Gen Forms within Sponsored InMail, the premium messaging service for paying members that commonly boasts opening rates of above 40%. More important? Lead Gen Forms within Sponsored InMail enjoy open rates three times higher than those on typical landing pages.

4. Amazon extends influencer program, courts Instagram and Twitter creators

Amazon jumped into influencer marketing back in April with a program that provides commissions and vanity URLs to YouTube power users who link to Amazon product pages. Now the company's bringing the same opportunity to those influencers who call Instagram and Twitter home.

With influencer marketing expected to generate $2.4 billion by 2019, it's a smart move for Amazon, and an exciting opportunity for influencers who now have a new potential revenue stream for many of the products they're probably already promoting without benefiting.

5. Chinese startup to buy Musical.ly for about $1 billion

The Shanghai-based social app became a phenomenon in the way that it lets users easily stitch together lip-synced music videos. Fast-forward just three years, and this favorite of app stores is set to sell to a Chinese media startup for somewhere in the $1 billion ballpark.

Why is Musical.ly one to watch? It's the first Chinese social app to hit in big in the American market, and it's also probably the most successful video app not (yet) owned by Facebook or Google.

But investors might not be convinced just yet: Most of Musica.ly's users joined within the app's first two years of existence, suggesting a stagnation that could plague the app's growth and tarnish its potential in the eyes of Wall Street.

6. Facebook encourages collaboration with new Stories for Groups and Events

The social network is giving its Snapchat Stories clone a feature that Snapchat didn't yet make happen: collaborative Stories for Groups and Events within the Facebook app.

The new Stories will let invitees to Events or members of Groups contribute to one common Story that's visible to all members, with admin moderation. The new Stories format will let users on Facebook and those present in-person experience events such as weddings, meetups, conferences, and more from every angle.

Facebook is also making a move to integrate Stories into Facebook Lite, the stripped-down version of its app meant to attract users in markets with low bandwidth or high data costs.

7. Pinterest just launched its own version of QR codes

The social pinboard platform has announced Pincodes, its own version of QR codes, that let users easily find products and inspiration on the platform by scanning them with Pinterest's mobile app camera. Pincodes redirect users to specific boards or collections on the social network (such as Nordstrom's "Gifts under $100"), or directly to a brand's profile.

Kraft will use Pincodes on an upcoming product to showcase recipe ideas and hacks, while Kia will create a Pincode display at an auto show to highlight design features of a new vehicle. Brands can find out how to make a Pincode here.

8. LinkedIn launches free mentorship program for users in the US, the UK, and India

LinkedIn's expanding the mentorship service it tested with a closed group of users in San Francisco and Australia earlier this year, and now it's rolling out for all users in the US, the UK, and India. The new section, "Career Advice," connects users with mentors who can help with anything regarding your existing career, or the one you'd like to change to.

Users embark on a Tinder-swiping-like journey that lets them specify goals and what mentor profile they're in search of.

With Facebook and Google on its heels, LinkedIn's looking for just about anything that can help it differentiate its platform and keep users engaged. We think this could be a good one.

9. Some users can now follow hashtags on Instagram, and you might soon, too

Facebook's Instagram is testing a way to let users follow specific hashtags on the platform, surfacing top posts and recent stories related to the key words.

Up until now, users on the photo and video sharing app could follow only individual users, so the ability to follow hashtags would enable them to stay on top of breaking news, follow topics that are important to them, and even help us social media marketers out with tracking campaign performance and engagement.

For now, it's just a test, but we hope this one will make it around to the next app update.

View image on Twitter

Pippa Akram@Social_Pip

Ok this is new. What does this do @SimonSocialMM @BizPaul@NatalieTFG any ideas? I've followed 2 but can't find what that means!!

4:21 PM - Nov 9, 2017 · Hitchin, England

•  99 Replies
 
•  88 Retweets
 
•  1919 likes

Twitter Ads info and privacy

10. We'll wrap with social engineering through social media

The whole world's talked a lot recently about Russian involvement in fake ads on Facebook, and their potential to sway elections. But will that conversation really tackle the root of the problem?

Forbes asks just that question while shedding light on the possible half-billion fake Facebook profiles that might be stemming social discord and, in turn, socially engineering our society.

A Forbes Agency Council contributor argues that fake profiles across the social Web, capable of generating thousands of seemingly authentic conversations in a matter of seconds, are the true culprits. Countless influencers—real or fake—post across platforms without disclosing their monetary ties for endorsements or their intentions. Although the FTC has begun taking steps to address the problem, it's no match for the new technology that has enabled the mass creation of fake profiles and personalities at rapid scale. Can Facebook really save us?

3 Must-Do Customizations For Your Social Video Posts

Marketing today is an entirely different world than it was 10 years ago. What’s driving this massive shift? Consumers expect tailored experiences that are designed to fit their personal needs, and as a result marketers are obligated to create various strategies for distinctly different personas and platforms. When it comes to creating a social media video strategy, these same expectations hold true. There are countless considerations that must be made when it comes to developing a social video presence: diverse audiences, different social platforms, various regulations, and best practices – to name just a few.

With all of these considerations and priorities fighting for our attention, where’s a video marketer to start? Start simple. Our social experts here at Brightcove recommend these three must-do customizations to make to all of your social video posts before they are published.

One-Size Does Not Fit All

Before we dig into the 3 must-dos, let’s start with a quick refresher of the differences between video use on the main social platforms. Just like a T-Shirt store’s “one-size fits all” really DOESN’T fit all, the same thing goes when it comes to posting videos to social platforms.The trends and requirements we are seeing within the social media market for optimal video lengths are:

YouTube

• Content type: Go-to place for longer content such as music videos, TV show clips, etc.
• Optimal length: 2-4 minutes
• View count: 30-seconds counts as a view
• Autoplay: Autoplay between videos
• 
  

Facebook

• Content type: Videos often viewed without sound
• Optimal length: 1 minute
• View count: 3-seconds counts as a view
• Autoplay: Video initiation is autoplay
• 
  

Twitter

• Content type: Short and sweet is key
• Optimal length: 30-seconds
• View count: 3-seconds counts as a view
• Autoplay: Video initiation is autoplay
• Customization Tip #1: Grab Attention with Custom Thumbnails

First impressions matter. An often overlooked (but very important!) aspect of publishing video to social channels is ensuring you have selected the optimal thumbnail image. I’m sure you’ve painstakingly selected the most engaging image you can for other content – why should video be any different? You need to make sure that the image your audience sees is something that grabs them and makes them want to press “Play.” This is why you should tailor your video posts to help build your brand by creating custom thumbnails. Custom thumbnails ensure that you are in control of what image is shown before your video begins to play. Whether it is a logo, or an image used within your marketing strategies, having a custom thumbnail will keep a consistent look and feel across all your marketing deliverables.

image: https://cdn.business2community.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Jh5UqdEabcNmlyMldNziNa51_TSZ_pfv1uYBQyaiv9fkHNp0nhFpZmEFJZd96JHFl6O0fM7dC1XS1FQRpB_7nPWXdwnMaK_ed26ip8Fs1k6KP_nD6C6qRI8-hveO9_5nY8TVRyB2.png



Recommended for You
Webcast, November 30th: How Zendesk Scaled to 100,000 Customers in 150+ Countries - Simply and Beautifully
Customization Tip #2: Capture the Right Audience with Tagging

Make sure to research the tags that are relevant for the audience and interest market you are looking to engage and use those tags within your video content. If you’re a Brightcove Social user, new features include the ability to add Audience Optimization Interests tags for Facebook and categorization tags for YouTube. These tags allow you to target and engage your specific audience more directly within your social channels.





Customization Tip #3: Maximize Your Content’s Potential with Clipping


As I’m sure you’re well aware, video on social media is hugely popular and voraciously consumed by users. But how can you create enough video content to keep up with the demand? Make use of what you already have. Take your longer video content and create multiple short form videos to post across all platforms. Brightcove Social’s clipping tools make this process simple. They allow you to create short clips without the need to go back to your video team, and without affecting the original video file. Each clip is a separate file, which is stored within your Video Cloud Media Library to access anytime.





We’re continuing to see social networks invest in video optimization, creating more sophisticated algorithms to help tailor newsfeeds to be more personalized and targeted to the audience you are trying to reach. It is up to you to capitalize on this, and get your video content to the audience you are targeting. These three recommendations will help you do just that.

#SocialSkim: Twitter Doubles Character Limit, Facebook Rolls Out Messenger 2.2

This week's 'Skim: Twitter officially doubled the number of characters you can tweet, and the (so far) surprising result; Facebook launches Messenger Platform 2.2 with all sorts of new capabilities for brands; Facebook launches polls for users and pages; Snap stock takes a tumble, and the company looks to an algorithmic feed for help; Twitter's new advertising subscription service could help small businesses; engagement on LinkedIn is on the rise, and how you can take advantage; much more...

Skim for your weekly download!

1. Twitter just doubled its character limit, but nobody is using it

It's official: After only a couple months of testing, Twitter has rolled out a 280-character long limit to all users on the platform. Your company now has a lot more space to communicate with fans.

How did it happen so quickly despite users' concerns that more characters would mean reading through too much text? It turns out that not many people actually want to write more than 140-characters.

In fact, just 5% of tweets during the testing period tweeted with more, suggesting the user experience will remain unchanged, at least for the time being, while simultaneously decreasing headaches of marketers around the world who just need to get in that one extra word.

2. Facebook is rolling out Messenger 2.2, and here's what you need to know

The social network is taking new steps toward monetizing Messenger, and it's bringing brands closer to their consumers in doing so. Within the next few months, Facebook will roll out the ability for all businesses to send sponsored messages to consumers who've already interacted with their brand's chatbots on Facebook Messenger. Though businesses will only be able to send one message in a 24-hour period, the messages won't be labeled as "sponsored" and will instead appear just like other messages from friends.

During its release presentation for Messenger 2.2, Facebook also unveiled a new plugin, dubbed Customer Chat, which lets your website visitors engage and chat with a human or bot natively on your site without having to navigate away to Messenger. That conversation can then be picked right up on Messenger when the user does leave. Customer Chat is currently in closed beta, but we already think this one will be a hit.

3. Snap Inc. shares collapse with disappointing earnings and slow growth

Snapchat might be talented at creating interactive features that users love—and Facebook loves to copy even more—but the company's not been so skilled at producing financial results that inspire investors. The third quarter losses of the social messaging app's parent company, Snap Inc., more than tripled, sending shares plummeting 16%.

Snapchat added only 4.5 million new users and lost a staggering $443 million in the third quarter, including a $40 million charge on unsold Spectacle units—the company's Snap-taking sunglasses and first foray into hardware.

With Facebook's Instagram copying its every move, Snapchat needs to reevaluate how it appeals to advertisers and, with that, how it can produce more revenue to make Wall Street a happier client. That's why it's about to join the algorithm club, "using data to power an algorithmically sorted Stories feed instead of the strictly reverse-chronological one it uses now," per TechCrunch.

4. Twitter launches a $99 advertising subscription service for small businesses

Twitter Promote Mode is a monthly $99 subscription that automates ad campaigns on the platform to make them seamless and easy for small businesses and personal brands. It'll automatically amplify users' tweets by turning them into ads that look like any other promoted tweet.

The benefit? Your tiny team doesn't have much to worry about in terms of setup since Twitter will simply promote things from your normal tweet stream. The drawback? Brands can't select exactly which tweets will be promoted, and there are fewer targeting options compared with the social network's full ad platform.

Promote Mode is already available in the US and UK as a public beta. It can be found within Twitter's mobile app and in the menu drawer.

5. Facebook introduces polls for users, pages

Though Instagram Stories might have seemed a more natural place for polls, Facebook's decided to bring the engaging feature to it flagship platform as well this week.

Users and page administrators now have the ability to create two answer polls—accompanied by photos or GIFs—across mobile and desktop Facebook platforms. The polling option, accessible when selecting to create a status, could help brands and users alike gauge things as important as consumer sentiment about a product, or craft simple posts that engages fans and followers in a new, addictive way.

6. LinkedIn algorithm: engagement is up, so here's how to take advantage

While most of social media world obsesses over the latest tweaks to Facebook's algorithm, much less emphasis is placed on how LinkedIn values content and promotes that content to its users. But with engagement rates for publishers on LinkedIn on the upswing since the beginning of the year, it might be time to take a second look at how you can optimize content even further.

MediaShift highlights why content that shows professional expertise is likely to go viral on the platform, what article titles work best, and what "FollowFeed" is and how LinkedIn uses it to rank where it will place your content across its network.

This is simply a must read for any social media professional looking to grow leads and business on LinkedIn.

7. Americans turn to social media for news, and we're not sure that's a good thing

A new study from Pew Research Center sheds light on the increasingly important role that social media is playing in delivering news to the public, with 26% of American adults reportedly getting news from two or more social media platforms.

That's up from 18% in 2016, and 15% in 2013, suggesting the upward trend is likely to continue. That makes some of us anxious, considering the overwhelmingly depressing revelation that over 126 million people in the United States were exposed to posts by Russian-backed ad buyers hoping to sway the results of the 2016 presidential election.

8. Facebook preps tests of peer-to-peer payments, 'breaking news' tags

What's Facebook up to in its latest hunt for new features and gadgets? It's all about money and news. The social network is reportedly preparing to test a new "red envelope" function that lets users select an amount of money as cash gifts to friends—a first. Until now, Facebook has supported peer-to-peer payments only on its Messenger platform.

Facebook is also experimenting with a way to let publishers indicate that a post is "breaking" material, which, without any official confirmation from the social network regarding the mechanics, could help publishers make posts more eye-catching, or even push them up in priority on the platform's algorithm.

ᴺᴱᵂ Matt Navarraᵀᴹ 

✔@MattNavarra

NEW: Facebook is testing a ‘Red Envelope' feature to send cash gifts to friends

1:29 PM - Nov 3, 2017

•  22 Replies
 
•  1616 Retweets
 
•  1414 likes

Twitter Ads info and privacy

9. Three must-do optimizations for your social videos

Video on social media isn't all created equal, and paying attention to the idiosyncrasies of each platform can help your brand better engage viewers. Aside from finding the optimal video length for each social network and the content type that performs best on each, Business2Community has three ways to customize your company's videos across the board, no matter the platform you're uploading them to.

From creating custom thumbnails for your videos and capturing the right audience with tagging, to maximizing your content's potential by clipping longer videos, check out how your business can optimize video for social. After all, the social networks are prioritizing video, so shouldn't you?

10. 10 tips to help you organically market on Instagram

Social is indeed becoming more and more of a pay to play space, but that doesn't mean your brand can't benefit in an organic way from social platforms like Instagram. In fact, by incorporating some easy-to-execute tips, your company can optimize posts for more effectiveness and engagement. Covered in detail:

• Ensuring your Instagram bio and website are clear and visible to users
• Knowing your audience and where they come from
• Creating brand identity hashtags that are unique
• Using free tools to upgrade your graphics and wow your followers

11. We'll wrap with BuzzFeed's social media card game that will sabotage your digital life

BuzzFeed was always good at finding just the right type of content to make people keep reading listicles, and now the media company is taking a shot at card games... with a social media twist. Introducing "Social Sabotage", a mix of Cards Against Humanity and truth or dare, that BuzzFeed describes as "an awkward party game."

The concept? Users draw a pair of cards that matches a social platform with an embarrassing behavior—for example, posting a video of you twerking on your Instagram or your grandma's Facebook page. (See an instructional video here.)

BuzzFeed says the game is meant to "implode your beautifully curated digital life," but we're not convinced this type of behavior will help society grow leaps and bounds beyond the serious issues of online harassment that already take place daily on social media. Thoughts? Fire back with your views in the comments below!