Welcome to Social Media Buzz Weekly, your weekly bulletin of the latest social media updates. With the social media landscape evolving with each passing day, it can be challenging to keep a tab on the rapid developments. Well, not anymore, as we have taken it upon ourselves to keep you abreast of every happening in the social media space.
So, without any further ado, let’s look at some of the most significant developments from the last week in the world of social media.
1. Meta Expands Roll Out of Generative AI Features for Ad Creation
Meta has announced an expanded launch of its new generative AI elements for ad creation, including text variations, background generation, and image expansion tools.
Each of these new elements will use generative AI to provide more creative options, either through suggested post captions, alternative image backgrounds, or generated visuals to use in different ad formats. This could provide significant benefit in your ad creation process, with Meta’s initial test pool finding that the new options saved them significant time, and helped them maximize their campaigns.
2. New Report Shows Referral Traffic From Facebook and X Continues to Decline
A new report has found that referral traffic from both Facebook and X has continued to decline over the past year, with social media traffic now contributing a much smaller chunk of your overall visitor numbers.
According to data from Similarweb, and analysis conducted by Axios, Facebook referrals to news websites have declined by around 80% since September 2020, while X traffic has shrunk by around 60% in the same period. That’s been even more pronounced of late, as both platforms look to lean into shifting user behaviors, like short-form video, in order to maximize engagement.
3. Meta Proposes $14 per Month Charge for Ad-Free Facebook
Meta wants to charge Europeans $14 as monthly charges if they don’t agree to let the company use their digital activity to target ads, according to a proposal the social-media giant has made in recent weeks to regulators.
The proposal is a gambit by Meta to navigate European Union rules that threaten to restrict its ability to show users personalized ads without first seeking user consent—jeopardizing its main source of revenue. Meta officials detailed the plan in meetings in September with its privacy regulators in Ireland and digital-competition regulators in Brussels. The plan has been shared with other EU privacy regulators for their input, too.
4. TikTok Announces Themed AR Effects and Top Hashtags for Halloween
TikTok has announced its latest Halloween activations, including a range of spooky-themed AR effects and visual tools to help users take part in the event.
The main element of TikTok’s Halloween push is make-up inspired effects, which will help to guide users on their Halloween looks IR, or re-create freaky monsters from horror movies. There’s a range of make-up generation options in the app, which can make it easier to decide on your Halloween look, while also providing options to share with your TikTok audience. TikTok’s also running a “Spooky Halloween” challenge with AR effects creators, with Effects House users eligible to win up to $2,500 for the best, most original spooky effects.
5. TikTok Partners With MVVO on Times Square Creative Clips Competition
TikTok has announced a new initiative, in partnership with MVVO Art, which will enable ad creatives to submit their work to be part of MVVO’s 2023 Ad Art Show, and have it displayed in MVVO’s showcase.
MVVO’s Ad Art Show seeks to celebrate artists who got their start in advertising, essentially recognizing the connection between great ads and traditional art forms. As such, the competition is more about recognizing the art itself, as opposed to ads in particular, but entrants do have to have some background in working in the ad industry.
6. Instagram Rolls Out Option To Share Stories With Multiple Group Lists at Once
Instagram has announced a new option that enables you to share a Story with multiple group lists at once, so you can better curate who sees your updates.
In addition to your “Close Friends” list, which has been available as a sharing option since 2018, Instagram will now also display other lists that you’ve created, so you can share your content with selected groups. So rather than public posting, you can feed your updates into your more enclosed group pods. And given that Instagram users now share way more content via DMs than they do in their feed, or via Stories, it’s a logical way to feed into that more intimate type of engagement.
7. X Launches Option To Restrict Post Replies To Verified Users
X has officially launched its new audience control option, which will enable users to limit their post replies to verified accounts only in the app.
In addition to X’s three existing reply control options, which it first added back in 2021, X is now also adding “Verified accounts” as an engagement control option, so you can restrict your responses to only those who pay to use the app. This could prove to be immensely beneficial, especially when you consider that fewer than 0.5% of X users are signed up to its Premium package. But for those who only want Elon Musk’s fans to be able to engage with them in the app, it could be a good way of ensuring that you only hear from like-minded users in response to your posts.
8. LinkedIn Adds Generative AI Elements to Recruiter and Learning
https://joshbersin.com/2023/10/linkedin-launches-exciting-gen-ai-features-in-recruiter-and-learning/
LinkedIn has unveiled its new “Recruiter 2024” project, which will add AI elements into its recruitment and hiring offerings, providing new ways to utilize automated insights and tools within your HR process.
The main element of the new Recruiter process is natural language commands in-app, so you can pose statements like “Find me a senior growth marketing leader” and Recruiter can guide you through the rest. The new Recruiter interface will include an ever-present, ChatGPT-like prompt window at the left-hand side of the screen, so you can ask it any questions to dig deeper into specific elements.
Wrapping Up
And that was a wrap of this week’s Social Media Buzz. We’ll be back next week with more news and updates for you from the social media world. Till then, stay tuned!
If you want to read more on the latest developments taking place in the social media space, take a look at ClickInsights’ Social Media Buzz, wherein we bring to you monthly reports on everything going on in social media, ranging from platform updates to policy changes that influence the way we market.