Google is testing the waters of short-form videos with a new platform similar to the popular but controversial TikTok.
The company announced it is be launching a new service called YouTube Shorts which will focus on short, catchy videos like those found on TikTok or Instagram Reels.
“Shorts is a new short-form video experience for creators and artists who want to shoot short, catchy videos using nothing but their mobile phones.“
For now, YouTube Shorts is limited to India as Google tests its features and public reception.
Though features will be limited at launch, Google says YouTube Shorts will eventually include a variety of features, including:
Create and upload videos of 15-seconds or less.
Edit videos with a number of creative tools.
Stitch shorter clips together with a multi-segment camera.
Add music to videos from YouTube’s library.
Speed up or slow down videos.
Timers and countdowns.
Early Version
The version launching to users in India this week is reportedly a very limited version of the tool including only a portion of the features that will be implemented in the final release.
The purpose of the early test is to get feedback from early users so the company can better prioritize their efforts before releasing the service to a wider audience.
Of course, this is likely not the only reason the company decided to test the service in India.
India banned TikTok from operating within its country on June 29 of this year, similar to the actions taken by President Trump to eventually force the company out of the U.S.
With this in mind, there is a clear opportunity to those who launch their own take on the tool in the country sooner rather than later. Still, YouTube has already confirmed it will be bringing YouTube Shorts to more countries in the near future.
LinkedIn is expanding its features to help business owners and employees feel more connected even though they may be working from home.
In the announcement, LinkedIn says people everywhere – especially in the professional world – are feeling less connected to each other during the ongoing pandemic.
The company cites a recent survey from Glint which finds:
31% of employees are feeling less connected to business leadership.
37% of employees are feeling less connected to teammates.
40% of employees feel less connected to their friends.
Combined, these statistics show a startling need for better tools to virtually connect employees, leadership, and even friends during these socially distanced times.
As LinkedIn says:
“With a growing number of organizations announcing that their employees are required to work remotely until 2021, it’s more important than ever for organizations to take action and ensure their teams will thrive in a virtual work environment.”
To assist with this, the social network is adding three new features for LinkedIn pages to better facilitate connections between businesses, their employees, and their communities.
Here are some quick details about the three latest LinkedIn features:
Find Out More About Your Followers
Companies have been oddly unable to see all of their LinkedIn page followers. Instead, the social network has only given businesses an aggregate total of their followers and some broad demographics about these users.
Now, business pages will have access to all publicly available information about their followers. You can even sort and filter these users by their location, industry, and current company.
“This provides the transparency needed to better understand audiences, so organizations can more easily share the right content and build their LinkedIn community around the conversations that matter most.”
Connect With Team Members In The “My Company” Tab
A new “My Company” tab is being launched to facilitate discussion and connection for employees working remotely.
The “My Company” tab includes a range of content and features, including:
Recommendations to connect with coworkers you may not know yet
LinkedIn also says more features will be coming in the future.
However, not everyone will have access to this tab. To be eligible, business pages must have more than 201 employees.
Track Upcoming Events
Virtual events have become a major part of staying informed and connected during Covid. Unfortunately, keeping track of all these events across countless platforms isn’t always easy.
Now, LinkedIn is adding an “Events” tab which will automatically collect your page’s past, present, and upcoming events on LinkedIn. This can include everything from a small online panel, webinar, or full-scale virtual conference.
The tab is included in the left-hand navigation menu on LinkedIn, so you can always find the latest events you and your company are participating in.
All these features are available worldwide for all eligible pages.
A new study of over 22 million Instagram posts suggests Carousels are the key to success on the platform, rather than posting single photos or videos at a time.
The findings come from Socialinsider’s recent report, which found posts containing a carousel receive more engagement than any other type of post.
Even more, the researchers dug into exactly what type of carousels receive the most clicks and engagement and what type of copy encourages action on these posts.
The Big Picture
Carousels took some time to catch on. In 2017, Socialinsider says just 3-4% of all Instagram content included carousel posts. By July of this year, that had climbed to 19%.
In general, carousel posts saw an average engagement rate per post of 1.92%, while images received 1.74% and videos got 1.45%.
When the carousel used all 10 pictures possible, that engagement rate climbed even more, though most carousels only included 2-4 slides. Just 6% of carousel posts actually utilized all 10 slides available.
Do More Slides Equal More Engagement?
While posts with the max amount of slides do perform the best, the study revealed that the situation isn’t as simple as “more images equals more engagement”.
Interestingly, it appears engagement decreases significantly with each additional image for posts with 2-5 slides. After this tipping point, though, engagement rapidly jumps as you add even more slides to the post.
Essentially, this shows that if you are going to include more than just 1-3 images, you should go ahead and fill at least 8 slides – if not all 10.
Mixing Media Pays Off
Another surprising detail uncovered in the data is that combining photos and videos in the same post tends to generate the highest engagement rate per post at 2.33%.
Despite this, the vast majority of carousel posts (88%) were entirely photo-based. Just 7% of carousel posts included both types of media, while 4% were video-only.
This is particularly interesting because video-based carousels slightly outperformed image-only carousels (1.86% compared to 1.80%) and drove significantly more comments.
Posts that included only videos drive a median 26 comments per post, while mixed media carousels receive 16 comments per post. Image-only carousels, meanwhile, see a median of just 7 comments per post.
Tell Users to “Swipe Left”
It might seem unnecessary to tell people to “swipe left” when posting a carousel as Instagram automatically shows an icon indicating users can swipe through a post.
According to the study, though, posts that include a message instructing to “swipe left” actually do perform slightly better than those without a similar call-to-action (2% vs 1.83%).
More in-depth information about these findings and other revealing information can be found in the full report here.
https://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Instagram-logo-text.png228640Taylor Ballhttps://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TMO-Logo.pngTaylor Ball2020-08-31 16:23:332020-08-31 16:23:35Using Carousels Drives The Most Engagement on Instagram [Study]
As part of an ongoing legal battle with the United States government, TikTok has revealed its total number of active users for the first time ever.
The hugely popular social app has been dominating the top charts of app stores for months, though it was never clear exactly how many people were using the app regularly.
In a new court filing as part of the company’s lawsuit against the US government, however, TikTok shared data about its daily active and monthly users.
Active US Users
TikTok receives as many as 100 million active users in the United States every month, with 50 million users returning to the site every day.
According to the company’s filing, that number represents an 800% increase since January of 2018.
Here are some major milestones in TikTok’s growth over the past few years:
11 million monthly US users in 2018
27 million monthly US users in 2019
91 million monthly US users in June 2020
Since June, the app says it has increased to finally reach 100 million active monthly users from the US.
Active Global Users
In addition to revealing the company’s active US users, TikTok disclosed its total number of downloads and active users around the world.
In total, TikTok’s app has been downloaded more than 2 billion times.
As of July 2020, the company is seeing 700 million active users around the world each month.
These highlights help show the overall growth of the app around the world:
54 million monthly active users in January 2018
271 million monthly active users in December 2018
507 million monthly active users in December 2019
While these numbers are certainly impressive compared to most social networks, TikTok still lags far behind Facebook’s 2.7 billion global active users each month.
Why TikTok Is Revealing This Now
While TikTok has steadily become one of the biggest online platforms around – especially when it comes to younger internet users – the app is in danger of being banned from the United States next month.
The Trump Administration has filed an executive order which would ban TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, from operating in the United States. This came following concerns the Chinese-owned app was being used to collect personal data on Americans.
TikTok has denied these claims and is fighting the executive order in court saying the company has been denied due process.
If the company loses in court, it is also possible TikTok’s US operations could be sold to an American company like Microsoft.
https://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/tiktok.png349640Taylor Ballhttps://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TMO-Logo.pngTaylor Ball2020-08-27 14:54:122020-08-27 14:54:12TikTok Reveals It Has 100 Million Active Monthly US Users
Instagram has begun showing postings for users you don’t follow when you’re all caught up on posts from those you do follow. The decision is not without controversy, however.
Starting this week, users are seeing a new “Suggested Posts” section filled with content similar to those they already follow. The section doesn’t appear until you’ve scrolled past everything shared from people you follow and you have seen the “You’re All Caught Up” screen.
Though brands, marketers, and publishers may be excited about Instagram introducing organic related content into users’ feeds for the first time ever, the user base has largely been critical of the decision.
What Are Instagram Suggested Posts
Once users have scrolled to the “You’re Caught Up Screen” they are now seeing an option to “View Older Posts”. If selected or the user continues to scroll, they will be shown an infinite feed of suggested posts.
Aside from the banner showing that you are viewing older posts, there is no indication that the content is being automatically selected based on your past browsing behavior.
One complaint many have had is that Instagram already has a dedicated “Explore” section for finding posts and accounts you might be interested in. However, the actual content in these sections differs.
The Difference Between Instagram Suggested Posts and Explore
Though they share some similarities, Suggested Posts are distinct from the Explore section in some key ways.
Primarily, Instagram intends for Suggested Posts to be a curated collection of content based on your interests and activity. On the other hand, the Explore section is intended to be an extension of the search function on the platform, allowing you to explore broad topics and interests.
As Instagram explains in a help center article, the content highlighted in the Suggested Posts section is largely defined by your own behavior:
“These suggestions are based on posts from accounts like the ones you follow and posts similar to the ones you like or save.”
You can also flag posts if they are particularly not of interest to help better refine the content shown to you in the future. To do this, just tap the three-dot icon at the top of the post and select the “Not interested” option.
Another distinction is that Suggested Posts will exclusively feature photos and videos, with no IGTV or Reels content allowed.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the explore section will also include promoted posts and other types of ads.
Why The Decision is Controversial
Complaints about the decision have largely been focused on three issues:
Users are not accustomed to seeing content they didn’t sign up for in their primary feed.
Creating an infinite scrolling feed could encourage users to spend excessive amounts of time on the platform.
The infinite feed makes Instagram too similar to TikTok.
The first complaint is to be expected. Any time a social network has introduced organic content from outside your friends list or follows, users have revolted – whether we are looking at Facebook’s feed or going all the way back to MySpace.
To get an idea how users feel about the decision, just look at some tweets from users over the past few days:
Still, it is possible the feature may gain acceptance as users get accustomed to it. Only time will tell.
“Our goal is to make it clear when you’re all caught up so you can decide how you want to best use your time.
We see people continuing to seek out more posts they’re interested in after catching up with their feeds, so we wanted to learn from that and make it easier to go a little deeper for those who choose to do so.”
Lastly, concerns about Instagram looking a little too much like TikTok may prove to be shrewd positioning on the part of the platform. TikTok is currently facing a ban from operating in the United States unless the owning company ByteDance sells operations in the country.
As the 45-day deadline grows closer, little progress seems to be happening which raises the distinct possibility that users may soon be looking for an alternative.
https://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/InstagramLogo.jpg441800Taylor Ballhttps://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TMO-Logo.pngTaylor Ball2020-08-20 16:23:132020-08-20 16:23:15“Suggested Posts” Start Appearing On Instagram When You’ve Scrolled Too Far
As COVID-19 continues to be a major concern for people across the country, Facebook is introducing a new way for businesses and creators to monetize online events on the platform.
Critically, the company says it will not collect any fees for paid events held on the platform to help businesses and individuals struggling during the pandemic.
“Pages can host events on Facebook Live to reach broad audiences, and we’re testing paid events with Messenger Rooms for more personal and interactive gatherings.
In testing, we’ve seen businesses use Facebook to host expert talks, trivia events, podcast recordings, boxing matches, cooking classes, intimate meet-and-greets, fitness classes, and more.”
While Facebook is far from the first to offer a way to deliver paid events that are entirely streamed to attendees, their service is unique is the all-in-one nature. Facebook can handle not just the streaming, but payment, advertising, and organic word-of-mouth.
To put it another way, a person can see the ad for your performance in their feed, make a payment, and view your event without ever leaving Facebook. The company is also one of the only services which does not take a cut of ticket sales. However, purchases made on Apple devices or through the iOS Store are still subject to Apple’s 30% fee.
Prohibited Content
As with all content shared on Facebook, live events must stay within the Community Standards, Partner Monetization Policies, and Content Monetization Policies.
While these guidelines include the obvious things you might expect, such as banning hate speech, inciting violence, or “sexualized content”, the social network’s content policies prohibit some areas you may not expect.
For example, promoting health products including medical masks and hand sanitizer is currently banned on Facebook.
Other restricted categories include:
Debated social issues
Conflict or tragedy
Objectionable activity
Sexual or suggestive activity
Strong language
Explicit content
Misinformation
Misleading medical information
Politics and government
In addition to restricting these types of content, monetized events cannot include these some specific media:
Static videos
Static image polls
Slideshows of images
Looping videos
Text montages
Embedded ads
In the announcement, Facebook says the paid events will be available to brands and individuals for at least one year. After that, they may introduce new fees or even remove the service.
YouTube is giving us all a glimpse into how the world responded to the COVID-19 pandemic with a new batch of data showing what we’ve been watching in 2020.
The insights reveal a wide-range of trends, but an overall theme of self-care and learning new skills runs throughout.
Let’s check out some of the most revealing details from the report:
Home Cooking
As restaurant shutdowns spread in March and remain at least partially in effect across the nation, many have had to brush up on their cooking abilities or expand their repertoire.
Add to this that the shutdowns gave many considerable extra time to try their hands at cooking things which take hours or even days to do properly, and you may start to understand why sourdough bread was a major trend on YouTube this year.
“By the end of March, one could make a legitimate case that a good portion of the world was simultaneously fixated on how to achieve a superlative sourdough starter. And the evidence for that was on YouTube.”
Similarly, users around the world increasingly searched for “restaurant-style” cooking techniques and recipes to replicate their favorite eateries from home.
The company notes that it is extremely rare for countries around the world to all be searching for similar topics at the same time. Still, once the pandemic began in earnest earlier this year, global searches for cooking tutorials have been consistently heightened no matter where you live.
Self-Care
This year has been uniquely turbulent, which has led many to use YouTube to assist in or to learn new techniques for coping with anxiety or stress.
Specifically, people have been watching countless videos related to food, exercise, relaxation, medication, and peaceful sleeping since March.
This includes heightened searches for a variety of topics including:
Yoga (Daily views have doubled since March)
Guided Meditation (Daily views increased 40% since March)
Home Workouts (Daily views increased 4x since March)
Nature Sounds
Keeping Close While Social Distancing
Perhaps the strongest way YouTube has helped people cope with the ongoing pandemic is by providing a way to stay connected.
“YouTube viewers used video to engage with each other directly and indirectly, sometimes in nuanced ways: even just participating in a rising coffee-making trend can make someone feel more connected to other people.”
This is most obvious when looking at the data for a few notable video trends:
‘With Me’ Videos (Views of #WithMe videos jumped 600% since March)
Museum Tours (Daily views up 60%)
Face Masks (DIY tutorials have been viewed over 400 million times)
Dalgona coffee (A briefly viral treat connected users around the world)
Building Your Identity
Without our usual ways to express ourselves, many saw YouTube as both a creative outlet and a learning tool for further developing their identity.
“Video proved to be a unique way people could both express who they were and who they might become — say, by learning a new skill.”
This is reflected in a variety of video topics which have trended up since March, including:
Gardening
How to cut hair
Religious services
Video call beauty tips
YouTube as a Mirror
This data shows that people around the world have turned to a few basic needs when it comes to their content right now. From India to the U.S., YouTube says the uniformity of these trends has been “astonishing”.
When it comes to what people are watching right now, it all boils down to three basic needs:
https://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/YouTubeTrendsBannerSmall.jpg360640Taylor Ballhttps://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TMO-Logo.pngTaylor Ball2020-08-11 15:39:542020-08-11 15:39:56The Top YouTube Trends of The Year Reveal a Need For Connection
It was only a matter of time. Following TikTok’s meteoric rise to popularity, Instagram is taking the social network on head-on with its own short videos called Instagram Reels.
While the Facebook-owned platform has supported video content for years, Reels shares several key features that made TikTok a hit, including the ability to include licensed or original music.
Specifically Instagram Reels features:
Users can create and share 15-second videos.
Can include audio including songs from a catalog of licensed music.
Users can upload their own audio or grab audio from other videos to use in their own videos.
Instagram will also be creating a dedicated section in the Explore tab of the app, where users can find “Featured Reels”.
How To Create Reels
Creating a Reel is similar to taking a photo or creating any video on Instagram. Just open the in-app camera and slide the menu at the bottom to “Reels”.
Once selected, you’ll find a number of tools including a few specific to Reels:
Audio: Find a song in the Instagram music library or record your own audio.
AR Effects: Include visual effects from Instagram’s gallery.
Align: Line up objects from your previous clip before starting your latest video.
Speed: Speed up the audio or video you’ve selected.
Once you’ve gotten your song selected and set up any effects you want to use, just press and hold the capture button.
You can also combine a series of short clips into a single Reel.
Once you’ve finished recording and editing, you’ll be taken to a sharing screen. By default, Reels will be added to a dedicated tab on your profile. You can also choose to share the clip to your Feed ensuring all your friends will see it.
Why This Matters
Over the past couple years, TikTok has gone from an up-and-coming platform for kids to be goofy on to a bonafide part of online culture.
Still, many are hesitant to add another social network to their life by signing up for TikTok. With Instagram Reels, they can get in on some of the fun without creating a new account for another platform.
There is also the issue of TikTok’s recent place in world news. The Chinese-owned social network has been accused of gathering immense amounts of user data and sharing it with the Chinese government.
Twitter is testing the waters of launching a premium subscription service which would give exclusive features to paying members.
The concept of a premium Twitter service has been rumored for weeks, until CEO Jack Dorsey told investors the gossip was true. Reportedly, the idea has become popular within the company following a recent decrease in ad revenue.
“We are also in the early stages of exploring additional potential revenue product opportunities to compliment our advertising business. These may include subscriptions and other approaches, and although our exploration is very early and we do not expect any revenue attributable to these opportunities in 2020, you may see tests or hear us talk more about them as our work progresses.”
A report from CNN says the premium service could come as soon as later this year.
As for what the premium version of Twitter might look like, the company gave a sneak peek with a survey being sent out to some Twitter users.
The survey specifically asks users “Which of the following features would you most/least desire?”
The premium features suggested in the email include:
Undo Send: A 30 seconds window for you to recall/withdraw a Tweet before anyone can see it.
Custom Colors: In addition to “Night Mode,” you could change the fonts and theme color of Twitter on your phone and computer. Background color, links, mentions, hashtags, and icons would appear in whatever color you choose.
Video Publishing: You could publish videos up to 5x longer than current default, which a much higher maximum resolution (8192×8192).
Badges: You get a badge(s) on your profile that links to businesses you own or work for (Example: A journalist can have a badge showing the magazines they write for.)
Auto responses: Able to write and set a menu of auto responses to use in replies.
Social listening: You can see conversation around your account on Twitter, including total volume, the people and businesses who are talking most often, and what they are saying.
Brand Surveys: You could be able to survey people about the ads you run to better understand if your ad was memorable and if people are likely to buy the products or services featured.
Another survey sent out explored the idea of removing some ads for a fee.
Of course, the features proposed in these surveys may never come to fruition and any paid version of Twitter could look radically different than what has been suggested. As the surveys note:
“This is not necessarily reflective of what features Twitter will have in the future.”
https://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Twitter-1.jpg298640Taylor Ballhttps://www.tulsamarketingonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TMO-Logo.pngTaylor Ball2020-08-04 15:21:432020-08-04 15:21:44Twitter May Launch A Premium Subscription Service This Year
A new analysis of YouTube’s top 100 search terms of the year reveals more than just the most popular channels – it shows a subtle change to how users are engaging with the platform and what type of content they are most interested in.
While YouTube releases a few key findings at the end of the year, the company does not provide the data for the top 100 search queries each year. Thankfully, Ahrefs annually analyzes more than 800 million keywords used on the site using its Keyword Explorer tool to give us this report.
Top YouTube Searches
Below, we are including the top 25 searches for both the US and worldwide. For the complete list of the top 100 search queries, check out the full report.
Top US Queries and Search Volume
pewdiepie – 3,770,000
asmr – 3,230,000
music – 2,670,000
markiplier – 2,380,000
old town road – 2,040,000
pewdiepie vs t series – 1,940,000
billie eilish – 1,910,000
fortnite – 1,630,000
david dobrik – 1,610,000
jacksepticeye – 1,580,000
james charles – 1,560,000
joe rogan – 1,560,000
baby shark – 1,500,000
bts – 1,350,000
dantdm – 1,330,000
snl – 1,260,000
game grumps – 1,140,000
cnn – 1,120,000
wwe – 1,100,000
lofi – 1,040,000
minecraft – 1,030,000
shane dawson – 993,000
t series – 955,000
fox news – 943,000
msnbc – 936,000
Top Worldwide Queries and Search Volume
bts – 17,630,000
pewdiepie – 16,320,000
asmr – 13,910,000
billie eilish – 13,860,000
baby shark – 12,090,000
badabun – 11,330,000
blackpink – 10,390,000
old town road – 10,150,000
music – 9,670,000
peliculas completas en español – 9,050,000
fortnite – 9,010,000
pewdiepie vs t series – 8,720,000
minecraft – 8,560,000
senorita – 8,290,000
ariana grande – 7,890,000
alan walker – 7,560,000
calma – 7,390,000
tik tok – 7,270,000
musica – 7,140,000
bad bunny – 7,040,000
wwe – 6,870,000
queen – 6,660,000
eminem – 6,600,000
enes batur – 6,600,000
la rosa de guadalupe – 6,300,000
What We Can Take From This
While the lists are largely filled with the expected names like PewDiePie, Joe Rogan, and BTS, there are a few surprising placements that reveal a bit about what people are most interested in on YouTube.
Most clearly is the rising reliance on YouTube for music. Users have always looked up the latest music videos and singles on the site, this year’s data show that people are increasingly turning to the platform for music in general.
Nearly a quarter of the top 100 search terms in America relate to music (including the keyword “music” itself being in the third slot), and that number only goes up when looking internationally.
It is worth mentioning that ASMR – in the second highest spot in the US – is also a uniquely auditory experience.
Additionally, the top 100 shows a rising interest in news and current events. Alongside respected outlets like MSNBC, CNN, and Fox News, the complete list includes a number of satirical news figures like John Oliver and Stephen Colbert.
Most importantly, the top search terms reveal that people are beginning to use broader search terms than in the past. Yes, they are also searching for specific branded content like fortnite and snl, but they are also using broad terms like “music”, “lofi”, and “memes”.
Between this and YouTube’s suggested videos, this shows that the platform is still fertile with opportunities for smaller brands among the biggest names and influencers.
