Facebook Updates – Q3-2015
Facebook Video Ads: Facebook has started rolling out video ads to a small test group in order to attract more video content and ad revenue, which they have committed to sharing with their publishers at a rate of 55% – directly competing with YouTube.
Facebook Dislike Button: Straight from Mark Zuckerberg, it’s been confirmed that some sort of ability to “dislike” on Facebook…is finally coming!
Live Streaming for Public Figures: Just a few weeks ago, Facebook announced that live streaming for any public figures or journalists (with verified profiles) will now be live on your newsfeed! These changes will help public figures and important journalists to engage their followers and interact with their peers.
One Billion Users: Facebook hit a major milestone at the end of August with one billion, or 1 in 7, people using Facebook in a single day! To quote Mark Zuckerberg in his update, “it’s just the beginning of connecting the whole world”.
Facebook Launches M: M is a personal digital assistant (think Siri) inside of Messenger that completes tasks and finds information on your behalf. It’s powered by artificial intelligence that’s trained and supervised by people, and is currently in test phase before being released to a select audience.
Twitter Updates – Q3-2015
Tweets Now in Google Desktop Search Results: As of August 21, you have probably been starting to see relevant Tweets show up in your Google desktop search results. This stems from Twitter & Google’s partnership, announced about 6 months ago, and will only continue to help Twitter extend it’s social media arms to reach an even bigger audience.
Twitter + Google + Instant Articles: The idea, according to multiple sources, is that Twitter users or Google search users who click on a link while using their phones will see full articles pop up on their screens almost immediately, instead of having to wait several seconds. This makes it easier for publishers to distribute their content on mobile devices.
Instagram Updates – Q3-2015
Landscape & Portrait Mode: I feel like this update took way longer than it should have, but Instagram has finally announced its support for Landscape and Portait oriented formats. Now, when choosing a photo or video, you can tap the format icon to adjust the orientation to portrait or landscape instead of square. Once you share the photo, the full-sized version of it will appear to all of your followers in feed in a beautiful, natural way. To keep the clean feel of your profile grid, your post will appear there as a center-cropped square.
Instagram Advertising: As of Sept 30, Instagram advertising went live to all users. Instagram boasts that it’s ad technology rivals that of Facebook, with complex targeting functionality and ad formats that can help users shop for a product right from the app.
400 Million Milestone: Instagram celebrated a major milestone just last week, with 400 million active users!
Pinterest Updates – Q3-2015
Buyable Pins: Millions of pins are now ready to buy right directly through the app online. When you spot a Pin with a blue price, that means you can buy it. To see all the buyable Pins from a specific store, just visit their Pinterest profile, then tap the new Shop Pins button right on their profile.
100 Million Users: Although far behind giant social media rivals like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, Pinterest still hit the major 100 million milestone for its user base.
Buffer Updates – Q3- 2015
Buffer for Video: As of late August, Buffer customers can now upload, share, and schedule video from Buffer to all your social media networks. You heard right: upload the video once, and share it everywhere: including Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and Google+.
Conclusion
That wraps up our summary of the top social media updates from July through Septemebr 2015. Stay tuned for our next post at the end of 2015, where we’ll wrap up the entire year of innovative updates and changes to our favorite social media platforms.
For more information about the future of advertising through the original social media giant, check out our free downloadable eBook on Facebook Advertising.