The week in social media news curated by your friends at Fandom Marketing. Instagram introduces new tools. Twitter is testing retweet copy limits. New study reveals teens do still love Facebook after all. Sizing up the social media habits of high school grads. Read on for the full story.
Introducing New Creative Tools on Instagram
We’re delighted to bring you a set of new creative tools on Instagram with the ability to adjust brightness, contrast, saturation, warmth and more. Inspiring creativity is incredibly important to us—and as the Instagram community grows, we’ve been excited to hear requests for more ways to creatively take hold of how your photos look and feel. When you go to select a filter, you’ll now see a new wrench icon. Tap it and you’ll find a tray of photo editing tools ready for you to explore. You can also now adjust how much of a filter you apply to a photo by double tapping the filter icon.
Full story on Instagram blog
Twitter Testing Ways to Add Commentary to Retweets
June 23, 2014
Twitter is always testing something with users; this week, they have a couple visual experiments underway. Another new feature, which Mashable first noticed in a tweet sent by Twitter’s head of communications, Carolyn Penner, allows users more space to comment when they are retweeting another user. “Retweet with Comment” surfaces the retweeted message as an image, leaving users with just under 140-characters to share their own thoughts. Previously, if someone wanted to add their own commentary to a retweet, they could click “Quote Tweet” to do so.
Facebook News Feed Update Sets the Stage for Video Ads
June 24, 2014
Facebook is trying to figure out which of its 1.3 billion active users like videos, and which don’t bother watching. The social network tweaked its News Feed algorithm on Monday, a common occurrence for the company, in hopes of providing users with “better” videos on the platform. The tweak includes a new video ranking system which takes into account whether people are actually watching each video — and for how long — before deciding who else will see that video in their feed. Previously, metrics like Likes and comments were key indicators of a video’s popularity, but the new measurement aims to determine exactly how captivating the video content is.
Full story on Mashable
Teens love Facebook after all, says new Forrester study
June 24, 2014
Remember, just six months ago, when a couple of studies said Facebook’s teen user base was fleeing? Well, that might not be the case after all. In a Forrester Research study released Tuesday, teens overwhelmingly came out in support of Facebook. Forrester talked to a little over 4,500 kids ages 12 to 17. Of those, over three-quarters said they use Facebook at least once a month, and a third said they use the site “all the time.”
Full story on Venturbeat
Sizing Up the Social Habits of 2014 High School Grads
June 26, 2014
According to June 2014 research from online review community Niche, 87% of 2014 high school graduates in the US used Facebook, and 61% of them checked their newsfeeds at least once per day. Instagram was the next favorite social network, with 66% of this year’s graduating class using the platform at least on occasion.
Full story on eMarketer
Foursquare will charge some companies for access to location data
June 27, 2014
Foursquare plans to start charging companies making the heaviest use of its vast local business database. The massive resource has gradually been enhanced through the years as Foursquare has grown and compiled over 6 billion user check-ins. Thanks to all that activity, the company’s location database is seen by many as superior to similar services from Facebook and others. (Many users were displeased when Instagram moved away from Foursquare in favor of Facebook’s solution.) Foursquare obviously risks angering developers and pushing them to research other options by charging for access, but COO Jeffrey Glueck told The Wall Street Journal that the fees will impact less than 1 percent of companies currently pulling from its database.
Full story on The Verge
What We’re Watching
Growing a following on Twitter takes effort and real interactions. If you think you can set it and forget it, don’t expect to see results. Plan to spend a minimum of one hour per day on Twitter to make a true effort. It needs a content strategy, editorial planning and campaign budgets just like every other marketing tactic. Here are some great tips from Twitter on just how to do that.
~ Melonie
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