This Week in Social (Week of April 28)
This Week in Social is a weekly digest of some of the biggest stories in social media marketing news. These stories are the show notes for the Brave Ad World Podcast. Each story is discussed at a deeper level on the podcast.
Instagram Starts Testing Video Ads (Read more at AdWeek)
Instagram has been slowly but surely rolling out sponsored content onto its platform, and now it looks to expand into video. The photo and video sharing platform has started testing video ads from brands like Levi's and Ben & Jerry's. The test coincides with Facebook's launch of atuoplay video ads, which play automatically in user News Feeds.
The video ads undergo the same rigorous tests for quality that images have notoriously required.
This is a natural extension of what Instagram can do from an advertising perspective. But Instagram is being vary careful for what sponsored content is allowed. It wants to and needs to maintain its reputation for high-quality, high-impact content for users. So it's likely we won't expect a full rollout or even self-serve ad offerings in the near future.
Twitter Shares Q1 2014 Earnings (Read more at The New York Times)
Twitter reported its Q1 2014 earnings under a great deal of pressure from Wall Treet. Twitter reported revenue of $250 million, beating analyst expectations of $241.47 million. Earnings per share came in at 0, beating the negative $0.03 forecast.
The biggest question lingering for Twitter, however, was around how its user base had grown. The platform now has 255 million users, 14 million more than the previous quarter and 25% more than this time last year. This number was less than analyst expectations, sending shares down 12%, hitting an all-time low for Twitter stock. This probably will not be helped on May 5, when Twitter employees have the first opportunity to sell their shares.
Twitter did see success from its mobile users. 78% of its total monthly active users are mobile, and mobile advertising was 80% of ad revenue this quarter, coming in at $180 million.
Timeline views reached 157 billion in this quarter, up 15% over last year but down from the previous quarter's growth.
Twitter took some significant steps this quarter. It launched its MoPub ad network, and it has continued to be a mobile-first company. It's data licensing revenue made up 10% of its total revenue. However, it recently acquired Gnip, so we may see this number go up.
Twitter's biggest challenge, however, is user growth and engagement. It's had a difficult time growing its base and getting users to use the platform frequently. Growth is okay when you're a private company, but unfortunately, Wall Street has expectations that Twitter is struggling to deliver on. They want Facebook, and Twitter may not be Facebook.
Facebook Extends Olive Branch to Developers at f8 (Read more at Mashable)
Mark Zuckerberg and other Facebook leaders took the stage this week for what will again become an annual event, its f8 Developers Conference. The goal of the event was for Facebook to showcase how it can benefit developers and encourage them to build on top of Facebook. The last f8 conference was in September 2011 just before it unrolled Timeline.
This time Facebook set a different tone with developers as it works to become very collaborative.
Facebook talked about its Parse tool, which it acquired last year. Parse helps developers build their apps and has been the foundation for more than 260,000 apps. Parse works by allowing developers to add push alerts and analytics to their apps more easily.
Facebook's biggest announcements, however, were around how users can log into apps. Facebook has been used in the past as a common way for users to log into third-party apps. Now, they can do so anonymously, keeping their identities private instead of sharing their profile information with third-parties. They can log in without sharing any personal information, addressing concerns around user privacy. It's intended to encourage trial of a user app and conversion rates for developers.
If users do choose to login with their Facebook credentials, they can pick and choose line-by-line what information they want to share and what information they don't.
Facebook also announced Audience Network, a mobile ad network. This product has been in testing since January and will allow app developers to make more money with their apps from more than 1 million advertisers. App developers who sign up will start seeing ads from Facebook running as banners, interstitials or even native units. Advertisers can leverage Facebook targeting in their buys.
Facebook has said that it is taking a people first approach and aims to give them more control over their data.
In addition, it released four new APIs to help media organizations integrate content and data from Facebook:
- The Trending API shows what people are talking about right now.
- The Topic Insights API shows insights about people mentioning a certain topic.
- The Topic Feed API shows you a ranked feed of public posts about a topic.
- The Hashtag Counter displays the number of times a hashtag has been used for a particular time frame.
Facebook clearly set a very different tone with this year's event. Anonymous log-in is huge for Facebook as far as offering a perception of valuing user data. This means, however, that developers who implement the feature, will be unable to collect as much data as they did before.
The Audience Network is also a huge move, allowing Facebook to generate additional revenue without cluttering up its core platform.
Facebook fared well during this year's f8, and it clearly aims to continue building bridges with developers in the future.
Snapchat Gets More Messaging Features (Read more at The New York Times)
Snapchat has come out with its biggest update to date by adding text and video chat features. The features add to Snapchat's core function of allowing friends to send ephemeral photos or videos to each other, and they allow users to feel they "have the full attention of your friend while you're chatting," according to Snapchat's blog.
Users now have the ability to swipe right over a contact name to pull up a conversation view, or they can access chats through the app's inbox. From there, users are able to have text message conversations with each other. However, you cannot chat with someone you haven't already exchanged regular photos or videos with in the past. Within these text message conversations, users can send photos taken from within the app or uploaded from their camera rolls. This is the first time the ability to upload through the camera roll has been allowed through Snapchat. Once users navigate away from the messages, they disappear in typical Snapchat form. However, individual messages can be saved by tapping the screen.
The second major feature, video chatting, allows users who have the app open and are in the same conversation to have a video call. When users are in that situation, a yellow capture button turns blue and can be held down to record video which then immediately appears on the other person's screen. This means the phone does not ring. Once the caller lets go of the button, the video disappears.
The final piece of the update is not a function but a look. The update comes with redesigned buttons and more polish to the interface. It also has a cleaner font and overall feel.
Snapchat certainly isn't the first to offer any features like this. We've seen Vine and Instagram offer private messages. FaceTime offers mobile-to-mobile video conversations. However, Snapchat has taken all of these features with the same, ephemeral approach it's become known for. It's not going to change the game in terms of bringing in new users, but it gives existing users more ways to interact, have fun and use the app without going elsewhere.
Foursquare Announces New App Strategy (Read more at SocialTimes)
Foursquare is going to split up into two app services, the first tracks and shares your location and is called Swarm, and the second and new app helps users decide where to go next. The new app will not have any check-in functionality whatsoever and will, instead, focus on delivering personalized recommendations on where to go and what to do.
We've seen unbundling of app features as recently as Facebook taking chat features out of its mobile app and emphasizing that users should download Messenger.
According to Foursquare CEO Dennis Crowley, "The unbundling is motivated by us listening to the users and observing the way users use the app, both watching them and seeing the data and what the data suggests. A lot of functionality is crammed into the Foursquare experience."
Foursquare's move is risky but perhaps a wise one. Users have fallen out of love with the check-in, and Foursquare has been taking steps to being more of a recommendation engine over recent months.
It currently provides users with suggestions based on where they are and what they think users will like. However, unbundling may be the best way to change user perceptions and use of the app. One app will be about discovery of places. Swarm and the check-in, if a user chooses to check-in, will be about discovering where your friends are.
News Quick Hits
- WIRED is reporting that Twitter is testing an overhaul for its user sign-up process. The Android sign-up uses Google information to populate profiles based on contacts. When users connect their Gmail accounts through the web version, Twitter scans user contacts and provides a list of suggested users to follow. From there, users are transitioned to an interests section in which Twitter works to match users up with accounts that match their individual interests. Finally, Twitter offers some suggestions for a first tweet. The goal is to improve user experience and avoid user attrition that has plagued the platform for some time. (Read more at WIRED)
- Facebook's rollout of Business Manager has begun for large businesses. Business Manager is a single interface that allows advertisers to manage multiple campaigns and pages. Here businesses can mange the team who can access various accounts while also inviting external partners to help manage various Facebook initiatives. (Read more at AllFacebook)
- Pinterest has hired Lisa Manowitz as head of partnerships on the East coast. Manowitz wil join other regional sales leaders, reporting to Joanne Bradford. Bradford's team will be responsible for building Pinterest agency relationships. (Read more at AdWeek)
- Twitter's MoPub mobile ad network has added Facebook's newly announced Audience Network to its roster of available ad networks, joining iAd, AdMob and Millennial Media. (Read more at AdWeek)
- LinkedIn disappointed Wall Street slightly this week with revenue forecasts for this quarter expected to be between $500 million and $505 million, below expectations of $505.1 million. It also expects sales to reach no more than $2.08 billion, below analysts' prediction of $2.11 billion. This led stock to slide and close at $161.22 even though it had a, higher-than-expected, 46% increase in Q1 revenue. However, it's taking steps to grow by moving into China this year. (Read more at Reuters)