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.

Google Gets Into Programmatic TV

Google is going to allow advertisers to buy TV advertising along with their digital video ads through its ad tech platform. Details around which networks and inventory will be sold are sparse, but this is the first time it’s been possible to buy TV through the Google’s DoubleClick.

Google Fiber, Wideorbit and Clypd are all part of the program, which gives Google a helping hand as they are TV ad tech companies. This effort will bring together TV and digital ads into a single programmatic buying platform, allowing both to measured and targeted side-by-side. The effort is limited to tests at this time.

These efforts all coincide with a desire from marketers to better compare how their advertising is performing across channels from digital to TV, and Google has hinted at this effort in the past, especially most recently with the launch of YouTube TV.

The challenge Google will face is among entrenched TV players. Google is arguably already part of a duopoly with Facebook when it comes to digital advertising. Advertisers, TV networks and other players will likely be concerned about giving Google yet more power.

Snapchat Continues to Make Ad Buying Easier with Geofilters

Snapchat’s opened up its API to make it easier for brands to buy location-based geofilters. Geofilters allow brands to give users graphic overlays for their photos and videos, but they are limited to specific locations.

The benefit of opening up the API is it now allows third-parties to tap more into Snapchat to offer bigger ad packages, while automatically controlling targeting, locations and timing. Before this, geofilters could be purchased through Snapchat’s self-serve buying option. Beyond that, it’s making it easier for specific services like WeddingWire to sell geofilters for specific locations as part of packages they offer customers.

This isn’t a replacement for self-serve, which allow brands to have a bit more control over their buys. Opening up this API gives sponsored geofilters greater scale and more options for marketers to optimize their buys based on multiple factors, including timing and target audience. It’s part of a larger effort by Snapchat to make itself more available to more brands as it grows into the shoes of being a public company.

Facebook and Google Continue Push Against Fake News

Fake news… everyone agrees it's a problem, but its definition is still up for debate. That’s not stopping digital companies, though. Facebook and Google are continuing their push to stem the flow of fake news distribution.

Now, on Facebook users will see “related” articles beneath news posts about trending topics in their News Feeds. For example, a story from one news source related to Syria will be accompanied by similar stories from other outlets below it. In the event that a fact checker has already debunked a post, that will be displayed as well. The goal is to offer alternative perspectives on the world’s events as it looks to help break into user’s individual bubbles of perspectives, but Facebook is calling this a test at this time.

Facebook’s not alone in making some changes. Google’s joining by making changes to its search algorithm to demote false, offensive and misleading articles in search results. Google’s staff will be flagging sites that post hoaxes and conspiracy theories as that content has been moved to the category of “low-quality.” Google’s also making changes to its auto-complete to remove offensive auto-complete queries.

Fake news has made its way into the cultural conversation, and that led many to ask what role tech companies had to play in its spread. While they push back initially, concerted efforts, particularly from Facebook have aimed at stemming the tide of fake news and preventing its spread.

The move is as much financial as it is moral. Advertisers have grown more aware of the context in which their brands are featured, so ensuring brands don’t show up adjacent to disparaging content has been a key focus for digital platforms.

Twitter Shows It Can Grow Its Users

Twitter showed some signs of life in its latest earnings report.

User growth has dogged Twitter almost since it went public, but in its latest report, it showed user growth of 6%, reaching 328 million users.

Many inactive accounts have also become active as users have turned to Twitter to follow political news and accounts.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t all good news as it reported a revenue decline of 8%, the first decline in revenue since going public.

Still, Twitter has taken steps to redefine its vision, and it’s cut outside programs to focus on on its core, including its Fabric developer services business, which was sold to Google.

The revenue decline shows hope in recovering, especially after Twitter showed significant user growth for the first time in a long time.

It can’t be understated the effect President Trump’s had on Twitter’s business.

Twitter didn’t cite him specifically as having an effect but “political leaders of the world” were cited as a reason for the increased attention on the platform.

News Quick Hits

Pinterest’s like button is being phased out “in the coming weeks,” to be replaced by a more prominent Save button, which used to be known as the Pin It button. Pins users have liked in the past will be moved to a private board called Your Pinterest Likes. The goal is to give users a single option as it was never clear why a user would click or tap Like instead of Save.
LinkedIn is upping its ad retargeting game with the launch of Matched Audiences. Matched Audiences will allow advertisers to target users based on website retargeting, account targeting and contact targeting. Website Retargeting lets advertisers target website visitors. Account Targeting allows them to upload a list of company names and target decision makers at those companies, and Contact Targeting is similar except its targeting users by uploading specific email addresses.
LinkedIn now has 500 million users. The professional social network has quietly been growing , revamping its advertising options and been consistently delivering to investors. While other social networks continue to get the headlines, LinkedIn has consistently grown its company, despite challenges in active users.
Twitch is allowing its content creators to make more money. Now they’ll get paid whenever they receive animated emoticons called “bits” from their viewers. The move comes at a time when Twitch is facing increased competition from both YouTube and Facebook with its Live offering.
Twitter COO Anthony Noto has revealed some potential plans for Twitter’s future. That vision being delivering live video content 24/7. The vision makes sense as Twitter’s found unskippable 15-and 30-second ads being quite lucrative for the platform, which it was really able to establish with last year’s NFL streaming deal. That deal’s been taken over by Amazon, but it established Twitter as a potential live streaming leader.
Facebook is testing video cover photos for Pages. The test is currently taking place on the Narcos Netflix show Page.
Facebook is improving its pixel tracking to capture additional information and actions on websites, including “add to cart,” “click to call” and purchase.”
Alphabet’s latest earnings report shows strong results, beating analyst projections after four straight years of missing the estimates during Q1. The report showed strong performance in mobile ads and YouTube, showing the advertiser boycott of YouTube had little effect.