Happy's marketing news - 09.02.18
It’s time to delve into the marketing news for the past seven days with Happy’s bite-size chunks!
In a move that was long overdue, Instagram announced that it would allow for scheduling of posts ahead of time—but with a twist. You can’t schedule a post directly on the Instagram app, but you can schedule through one of Instagram’s partners, such as Hootsuite, Sprinklr or Sprout Social. The feature was announced yesterday, the latest in a series of updates being rolled out for the Instagram Graph API redesign. Other previously announced highlights of the redesign include the ability to find posts that the account has been @mentioned in, comment moderation and further insights of organic content.
Twitter has reported its first quarterly net profit helped by a rise in video advertising sales. The news sent the price of Twitter shares surging 26% in pre-market trading in New York. That was despite the number of people using the social network coming in below expectations. Twitter’s previous failure to make a profit had confounded investors given its widespread use and popularity among celebrities and politicians. Net profit was $91.1m (£65m) in the fourth quarter of 2017, compared with a loss of $167.1m for the same period a year ago.
Snapchat has begun a full-scale rollout of the redesigned version of its app to UK-based users. The revamp is intended to separate social interactions with friends from third-party content. The new design comes as Snap stocks soared by nearly 50% on Wednesday afternoon – the day after it announced strong fourth-quarter results. But the redesign has not gone down well with users, with up to 83% of reviews on the App Store being negative.
Publishers who are looking to reduce reliance on Facebook since the social network announced plans to deprioritize news are giving LinkedIn a fresh look. LinkedIn is best known as a social network for business professionals, but even publishers beyond the business space are eyeing the platform to see where they can capitalize on it. News UK titles The Times and Sunday Times don’t post any content to LinkedIn, but the publisher said it plans to make publishing there a bigger focus this year. HuffPost UK is working on an editorial series of work-related videos and text articles more suited for LinkedIn. Lifestyle publisher Shortlist Media is hiring several people to focus on LinkedIn.
The government has launched a review of how online platforms including Facebook and Google pay news outlets, with the Prime Minister today warning the demise of many newspapers is “dangerous for our democracy”. Noting the fall in print circulation and the failure for online revenues to catch up, the review will look at the overall health of print media, looking at the range of news available and how the press is adapting to the challenges presented by digital. That will include “the role and impact of online platforms such as Facebook and Google, and the digital advertising supply chain”.
