With the 597 days of January well and truly behind us, we’re taking some time to review the social media updates that you need to know about!
So, grab your drink of choice and sit back as we dive into the January Round-Up!
We’re kicking off our social media updates with LinkedIn and they’re going all in on paid advertising.
Firstly, LinkedIn has increased their ad prices due to the increase in demand… you can thank X for that!
Unless you’re active in paid advertising on LinkedIn, you may not be overly worried about this update. But if you’ve boycotted X, or you’re thinking about it, be sure to check your budget.
Sticking with ads, LinkedIn is moving to new ways of targeting and will retire their lookalike audience feature.
If you’re currently running an ad using a lookalike audience, they’ll still run but to a static audience pool. LinkedIn will automatically archive inactive or unused lookalike audiences.
And finally, LinkedIn has launched a new ad-tracking option called Website Actions. This new option uses the ‘LinkedIn Insight Tag’ on your website which will connect your web response to the in-stream activity.
Surprisingly it’s been relatively quiet for X this month! That being said, there is a small handful of social media updates to review!
We’ve now seen that video is coming to Spaces Broadcasts. Live video isn’t a new concept… at all! So essentially, users will be able to live stream video spaces with multiple other users. But it’s worth noting that there isn’t any word on how many guests you’ll be able to have!
Sticking with video, X is testing the addition of a video tab to the bottom ‘function bar’. Based on previous insights, showing that video content received 10x more engagement, it seems a sensible move for X to pivot to a video-first platform.
In an attempt to retain users, the focus on video continues in this next update!
3 new shows are being launched for X, starring a former US news anchor, a former US Representative and a Sports Commentator! Elon is aiming to produce increased original content by using the most engaged and interesting people on the platform!
We touched on this update back in November, and link previews are back… sort of! The upside, the link previews have returned (and rightly so!), and the downside… they’re tiny. Let us know if you’ve spotted them!
This final update means that advertisers will be able to specifically target users who are ‘Premium Subscribers’. We’re not too sure how to feel about this update… After all the selling point for Twitter Blue / X Premium was that users would get half the amount of ads!
Let’s start with an update to Notes. A new test has launched that will give users prompts on what to post notes about. It’s hoped that these prompts will generate group chats and more ways to engage.
If you’ve not updated your Instagram app, this next update might prompt you to do that! Users can now cancel their story uploads before they become public viewing! This is going to be handy if you spotted an error or forgot to include a link!
In a world where quite a few people have a ‘Finsta’, this next social media update is interesting!
‘Flipside’ is a brand new feature, which will allow users to share content with specific people (think friends-only stories etc).
The upside of this feature is that it should eradicate the need for having another account if you’re sharing content you don’t want specific people to see.
We’re talking Ads in this first update, and Meta are changing the way that users can target people via advertising. Targeting options that are too granular or have legal implications will be removed or consolidated.
Users running any ads that include any of the targeting options that are being removed will be notified via a ‘warning banner’ on the Ads Manager Page.
Like with other platforms, Meta has introduced a disclosure requirement for any ads that have been digitally altered. And rightly so in our opinion!
It’s just the one social media update for Facebook this month, and it’s about the addition of Link History.
Link History is a feature that will track the links that you’ve clicked on for 30 days, which is great if you accidentally closed something of interest! Don’t worry though, this can be turned off at any time.
We’re kicking off with a big update, and that’s the testing of 30-minute videos!
You read that right… 30-minute videos are being tested for TikTok! After the rise of TV and movie content being shared to the platform (in multiple parts), it makes sense for TikTok to test even longer content!
In an aim to be more accessible, TikTok is rolling out ‘new text size options’. This new option will be available to use via the settings menu if you have the latest version of the app. It’s worth noting that this update won’t impact the size of the text displayed on videos.
If you’ve ever struggled with which sounds to use on TikTok… why not create your own!? TikTok is looking into AI-generated songs!
This social media update essentially means creators can use basic text commands to create their own music…It’s fair to say the jury remains out on this update!
If you’ve been using the TikTok creator centre to look at trends, we’ve got bad news for you… The ability to search specific hashtags has been removed! You’ll still be able to see the top 100 trending hashtags, but you won’t be able to see how popular the hashtags you’re planning to use are.
As always, we’ll be back at the end of February to bring you the most up-to-date changes in the amazing world of social media.
In the meantime, if you’re looking to stay up to date with all things social – make sure to sign up to our mailing list. You’ll receive regular social media updates and information about upcoming training sessions with our amazing Founder, Natalie!
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