By Sara Hernandez
Keeping up with the changes on the social media scene is always a challenge. The services and functionalities are constantly evolving. New rules, changes in ownership and new user terms can also have a huge effect on users and brands. This is our guide to the changes on the social media scene during summer of 2016 and how to handle them.
Keeping up with the changes on the social media scene is always a challenge. The services and functionalities are constantly evolving. New rules, changes in ownership and new user terms can also have a huge effect on users and brands. This is our guide to the changes on the social media scene during summer of 2016 and how to handle them.
Facebook
During the summer Facebook made changes to the News Feed. Unfortunately for everyone running company pages most changes Facebook implements nowadays will decrease the visibility and traffic to these pages. This current change is no exception and posts by friends will increasingly get top positions, pushing down posts by company pages.
For managers of company pages this means that you will have to continue working with the quality of your posts and stories. Create content that your audience wants to read, share and engage with. And have a budget for advertising – when you really need to reach a wider audience.
Instagram
The big thing of summer 2016 is Instagram Stories. With Snapchat growing at a fast pace, Instagram is feeling the pressure and have launched a feature almost identical to Snapchat stories:
• Create a slideshow format of photos or videos – forming a story.
• Customize by adding text and drawings.
• The posts will disappear within 24 hours.
• The posts will not be part of the regular feed but featured at the bar at the top of the page.
• You can choose who can see your stories.
The only things missing are the funny faces filters.
This new feature presents a lot of possibilities for brands to develop their Instagram presence. Instead of posting stand-alone images or videos with a maximum length of 60 seconds it is now possible to create longer series composed by several images and videos in order to convey a message, present a news story or advertise products or events.
Twitter
Twitter updated the maximum length of video posts from 30 seconds to 140 seconds in June. They also introduced stickers – the possibility to add emojis, props and accessories to photos.
Besides these new features, more importantly Twitter now makes it easier to apply for a verified account. Twitter has allowed verified accounts for a while but now there is an online form to apply.
For all companies with an active Twitter presence we recommend to apply for a verified account. In these times of online fraud, brand jacking and hacker attacks, transparency and trust is important. A verified account is a guarantee of authenticity.
LinkedIn
In the beginning of summer, the news that LinkedIn had been acquired by Microsoft exploded in the media and blogs. We were all expecting big things or at least some changes coming out of this new union. But alas, the summer has been slow at LinkedIn and no new noticeable features have been launched.
Snapchat
Snapchat launched Memories during July. Memories is a feature that allows you to save snaps and stories on Snapchat’s servers for later use. Read more about this feature and how to use it in this blog post.
For brands the Memories feature can be really useful. Ordinarily the snaps and stories disappear from Snapchat after 24 hours or after they have been viewed. You can always save an image or video onto your own device, but with memories it is possible to save content centrally for later reuse.
Pokémon Go
Only if you have been vacationing on a remote island without internet access could you have missed the biggest buzz this summer – Pokémon Go. It is a location-based augmented reality game that has gripped the world, encouraged couch potatoes to exercise, caused trespassing incidents and made home owners annoyed to have their lawns invaded by enthusiastic players.
Some brands are always fast to jump on new opportunities, and Pokémon Go has been no exception. Brands have used screen shots from the game as social media content or attracted players to their locations by using features in the game. But there are many more things to come – in-app advertising opportunities and featured locations for example. We are also probably seeing the beginning of a general trend with more location-based games on the market. Companies will have to learn more about both challenges and opportunities for their brands in relation to this trend.
For more information, please contact Sara Hernandez, Director at Comprend (sara.hernandez@comprend.com).
