TikTok Reveals Its Latest Exciting Feature – Pictures

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Though TikTok is mostly known for its video content, the platform’s latest feature is a throwback. Along with new editing abilities and longer captions for content, TikTok has revealed it is introducing a Photo Mode within its app.

What Is Photo Mode?

As announced in a recent blog post, TikTok’s Photo Mode is a new post format that creates a carousel or slideshow of still images for users to share.

Along with their original images, users can add music, filters, stickers, and more to the carousel.

Ironically, the new post format is very similar to the type of content found on Instagram – which has been repeatedly accused of copying TikTok’s features.

Though nearly every popular social network has incorporated aspects of TikTok’s layout and features in the past year or two, Instagram has received the most criticism for the ways it has borrowed from the newer platform. This may be partially because many view the two platforms as rivals.

Enhanced Editing Features

Along with the reveal of Photo Mode, TikTok introduced new editing tools for videos, photos, and more. 

As the blog post says:

“TikTok’s enhanced editing tools allow you to easily adjust clips, sounds, images, and text in a new editing environment, all within TikTok’s creation flow.”

With the new tools you can:

  • Edit clips: Stack, trim, and split video clips.
  • Edit sounds: Cut, trim, and set the duration for sounds.
  • Edit and position text: More easily edit, position, and set the duration for text.
  • Add overlays: Add photo and video overlays for picture-in-picture (or video-in-video) stacking.
  • Adjust video speed: Speed or slow the pace of video clips.
  • Frame content: Rotate or zoom in and out of frame of individual clips.
  • Add sound effects.

The new features, including Photo Mode, have been rolled out to all users in the U.S. and most other countries.

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Facebook Launches New Streamlined Pages Experience For SMBs

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Facebook rolled out a new version of Pages specifically designed for small and medium-sized businesses to grow their brand and connect with customers and other companies.

The new Pages layout is broadly similar to what you are used to, but a little more streamlined to make managing your brand’s Page easier than ever.

Specifically, the new layout makes it easier to swap between your personal and business accounts, introduces a Professional Dashboard to control all your Pages activities in one place, and gives you access to a unique dedicated Feed to interact with your audience.

With the new layout, Page managers can easily swap between accounts by tapping or holding down on the top right menu icon.

Along with the new layout, Facebook offered five tips for getting the most out of the new page experience for your business.

1 Set your business profile up for success.

Complete your basic business profile: Add a profile picture and cover photo, description of your business, contact details like your website, phone number, address and business hours so that people can discover and learn about your business.

Customize your page: Add an action button to direct people to take an action from your page, such as Call Now, Send WhatsApp message, Buy Now and many more. Pin posts, shops and upcoming events to a new Featured section to highlight important information at the top of your page and in a simple way for people to scroll through.

Assign Facebook admins: Assign admins to help you manage your Page. Use the Page Access tab in the Professional Dashboard to control who can access and manage your Page. You can give access for only certain tasks, such as Advertising or Messaging.

2 Grow your audience.

Invite your family, friends and existing customers to like your page using the Invite Friends feature. Inviting friends, posting more often, getting page likes and responding to comments can all help grow connections.

Understand your weekly follower growth, get information about your followers, such as age and location, and track how your posts are doing with a simplified Insights tab in your Professional Dashboard.

Turn your top-performing posts into ads to show your content to more people by Boosting your post. Your ad may appear in different placements, such as Instagram.

3 Create better content.

Schedule your posts directly from the composer to publish at a later time, such as when your followers are most active.

Use trending hashtags to get your content discovered by a new and relevant audience. You can also share posts in up to 3 groups and link your Instagram to cross-share to your followers on Instagram.

Add the Get Message action button directly in your post to help get more messages from people who view your content.

4 Engage your community as a business.

Your business page now has its own Feed, which enables you to more easily engage with people, customers and other businesses on Facebook.

Join in on the conversation in the comments section of your own posts to delight and engage your audience. The posts that you engage with may also be shown again in your followers’ Feeds, which can further increase your reach. You can also engage with content from other pages’ accounts. Comment on posts as your Page to help build connections.

5 Account safety and security tips

There are a few safety checks you can do to help make sure your account is set up for success. Here is a quick refresher:

Set up 2-Factor authentication: Turn on 2-factor authentication and add an extra layer of security for your account. On Facebook, go to the 3 lines in the bottom right, tap Settings & Privacy on the bottom, then tap Privacy Shortcuts, then tap Use2-factor authentication. On Instagram, go to settings, tap Security, then tap 2-Factor Authentication..

Use comment moderation tools: Foster positive conversations and have more control over unwanted interactions with Facebook’s comment moderation tools.

Moderation Assist: Proactively moderate new comments on your posts by criteria you set in advance.

Choose who can comment: Limit who can comment on your organic public posts, from Profiles and Pages you follow to Profiles and Pages you mention.

Action on hacked accounts: If you think your account has been hacked or taken over, there are actions you can take to secure your account. Learn more about how to take action on Facebook on Facebook.

For more about the new Pages experience, check out the full announcement or Help Center page.

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LinkedIn Gives Brands 3 New Ways To Improve Their Page

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LinkedIn introduced three new features for Pages recently to make it easier for brands to develop better connections with their audience.

With these new features, your business can improve its content, help guide the conversation in your comments, and highlight your company values more prominently.

While the company only recently announced these features, they have been rolling out to users throughout the past month. So some may just now be getting access, you may have spotted them across the platform already.

Post Templates for Pages

Having trouble generating content that actually sparks reactions and conversation? LinkedIn has introduced new, free, and customizable post templates for Pages to make sharing enticing content easier than ever.

Available in the mobile app, simply tap the “use template option” from the post menu and select from a variety of pre-created templates with clickable calls-to-action. Once selected, each template can be customized with unique colors, fonts, text, and more to deliver a post that stands out and drives conversation.

Pinned Comments

Comments sections on popular posts can be hard to control, but LinkedIn is making it easier to guide conversations with pinned comments at the top of your brand’s posts.

You can also use this to highlight particularly helpful or thoughtful comments from others.

Pinned comments can be changed at any time so you can shape the conversation happening in real-time. 

Any responses to the pinned comment will also appear at the top of the thread, encouraging others to continue the conversation in that direction.

Featured Commitments Section

The new “Our featured commitments” section of LinkedIn Pages makes it possible for brands to showcase their company values to job seekers or potential business partners.

In this section, you can highlight up to 5 commitments to specific values, including:

  • Diversity, equity, and inclusion
  • Career growth and learning,
  • Work-life balance
  • Social impact
  • Environmental sustainability

Once you have selected your values, you can also host content that specifically demonstrates the ways your company upholds these values, such as videos, reports, certifications, or other types of content.

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TikTok’s Longer Content Descriptions Give Creators A Crucial SEO Opportunity

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Creators on TikTok are receiving way more space to describe their content and optimize it for the platform’s search engine. Over the weekend, many users started to notice that the limit for descriptions has increased from just 300 characters to over 2,000 characters.

The increase doesn’t just give creators more space to explain their video or page. Longer descriptions will also make it easier for TikTok to understand the content better, better include it in search results, and make more informed recommendations for users.

When you consider the impact these descriptions will have across the platform, it becomes clear that content descriptions are becoming a powerful optimization signal for those wanting to stand out on the increasingly competitive app.

How We Learned About Expanded Video Descriptions

It is unclear exactly when the feature started rolling out, but social media analyst Matt Navarra called attention to it Friday with a screenshot of a notification he received in TikTok’s app.

The full message says:

“You can now type up to 2200 characters in your posts’ descriptions: This allows you to express more details about your creations, describing what your videos show, giving you the opportunity to get closer to your audience, generating more engagement while becoming more searchable and better recommended by TikTok to viewers.”

TikTok is Becoming a Search Engine

If you haven’t spent much time on TikTok, it may come as a bit of a shock to learn that young people are increasingly using the platform as an alternative to Google’s search engine.

The phenomenon is so widespread, that Google has publicly addressed the shift, with Senior Vice President Prabhakar Raghavan stating:

“In our studies, something like almost 40% of young people, when they’re looking for a place for lunch, they don’t go to Google Maps or Search. They go to TikTok or Instagram.”

The longer descriptions signify that TikTok is also fully aware of this phenomenon and is prioritizing ways to improve its search results. For example, creators now have more flexibility to describe what happens in a video, include keywords that will help their videos be found by the right people, and provide links to a professional website or other social accounts.

Plus, longer video descriptions will even improve your TikTok content’s chance of being found on Google since the search engine has confirmed it indexes TikTok videos.

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Ecommerce Brands Increased Ad Spend On TikTok 60% In Q2

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TikTok continues to gain more interest from brands – especially ecommerce brands – as it proves that the social app is here to stay. New data collected from over 5,000 stores shows that ecommerce brands spent 60% more to advertise on TikTok in Q2 of 2022. Even more, analysts believe the trend will continue for the foreseeable future.

This information comes from Triple Whale ecommerce analytics, which gathered the data from all the stores using their tools to estimate the overall growth of ecommerce ad spend on the increasingly popular social video app.

“It’s time to get on TikTok while the needle’s still moving in the upward direction, or before users are completely inundated with ads from new brands,” advises Triple Whale. TikTok “is no longer a channel serious paid media buyers can avoid without cutting into revenue and profit.”

Other Findings About Ecommerce Q2 TikTok Ad Spend

Notably, the most significant increases don’t come from major brands. Smaller retailers with annual sales between $1 million and-$5 million are instead leading the charge.

Along with these findings, the report also included a few other interesting facts:

  • Overall ad spend across the 5,000 online retailers rose by 11% in Q2 to a total of $529.7 million
  • Retailers with revenues between $1 million and $5 million are contributing to the biggest increases in ad spend
  • In the first two quarters of this year, retailers spent a total of $48.4 million on TikTok ads – which was a 231% increase over the previous 6 months
  • CPMs vary by industry. Baby, books and collectibles niches have a CPM below $10, while health & beauty & digital products are over $14 CPM
  • Stores with over $25 million in sales have the highest average order values and ROI

How TikTok Compares To The Competition

While TikTok is showing impressive growth in popularity among online retailers, it still trails Facebook and Google by a significant amount. Specifically:

  • Despite only growing 5.6% from Q1, Facebook remains the leading ecommerce choice for advertisers by a wide margin
  • Google grew 20.5% in Q2
  • Snap declined 10.8% in Q2

If you’ve been writing off TikTok as just another social network that will be here today and gone tomorrow, it is likely time to reconsider. The platform seems to be cementing its place among users and winning over brands through increased ad revenue.

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Twitter Reveals New Features Including A Long Awaited Edit Button

Twitter has revealed several long-awaited features this week, including new ways to filter the content on your timeline, the ability to limit who can see your tweets to a specific group, and even the ability to edit tweets.

Let’s explore what each feature does in detail and when you might see it in your feed below:

Topic-Focused Timelines

Twitter is publicly testing new timeline options for users which will gather content related to recent events or themes. 

Though the feature was previewed earlier this year, users finally saw the first example of one of these topic-focused timelines on August 24th around the airing of ABC’s “The Bachelorette”. 

While some are calling these “custom timelines”, these topic-focused timelines will be generated via Twitter’s content algorithms using a combination of search terms, usernames, topics, and manual curation. 

Twitter Circles

The social network is introducing a new way to limit who can see specific tweets.

Twitter Circles allow you to select a number of specific users who will be able to see specific tweets that other users cannot. 

The most obvious use of this feature will be letting public figures publish more casual or personal tweets to their close friends while still maintaining a professional appearance for most users. 

Additionally, brands might use Twitter Circles to give access to an exclusive group of up to 150 followers – potentially delivering exclusive promotions or product sneak peeks. 

Edit Published Tweets

After years of requests from users, Twitter has confirmed it is finally testing an edit feature that would let users change the contents of their tweets for up to 30 minutes after posting. 

The company announced the test via a tweet, though a since-published blog post provided more details about how the feature will work and who will have access.

As the blog post says:

“We’re hoping that, with the availability of Edit Tweet, tweeting will feel more approachable and less stressful,” Twitter said in the blog post. “You should be able to participate in the conversation in a way that makes sense to you, and we’ll keep working on ways that make it feel effortless to do just that.”

Once edited, tweets will also include a timestamp, icon, and label indicating it has been updated.

While the feature is hotly anticipated, users may be disappointed to hear that the edit button will be limited to paying Twitter Blue subscribers – at least initially. 

The company says its next stage of testing will give early access to subscribers so that Twitter can monitor how the edit feature is used by the public.

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US Teens Are Dropping Facebook In Favor of Other Social Networks

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Anecdotal evidence has suggested Facebook has been losing popularity with teens for years. Now, research from Pew Research Center confirms it.

Based on a survey of American teenagers between 13 and 17, just 32% of teens are using Facebook.  For comparison, a similar survey in 2015 showed that 71% of teens were active on Facebook at the time. Meanwhile, the majority of teens are moving to newer platforms such as TikTok and Snapchat.

However, the most universally popular social network among teens remains YouTube, by a wide margin. Based on the survey results, more than 95% of American teens use the video-sharing platform regularly,

Here’s the full list of most popular social networks among US teens:

  1. YouTube (95%)
  2. TikTok (67%)
  3. Instagram (62%)
  4. Snapchat (59%)
  5. Facebook (32%)
  6. Twitter (23%)
  7. Twitch (20%)
  8. WhatsApp (17%)
  9. Reddit (14%)
  10. Tumblr (5%)

Notably, the report indicates there are some slight differences in social media between genders:

“Teen girls are more likely than teen boys to say they ever use TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat, while boys are more likely to use Twitch and Reddit. Boys also report using YouTube at higher rates than girls, although the vast majority of teens use this platform regardless of gender.”

How Often Teens Are Using Social Networks

When the survey asked teens about how regularly they use the top four platforms, here’s what they had to say:

  • Close to 75% of teens visit YouTube at least once a day, with 43% saying they visit several times daily.
  • TikTok is used daily by 58% of teens, with 32% visiting several times daily.
  • More than half (51%) visit Snapchat daily, and 29% say they visit several times daily.
  • 50%  visit Instagram daily, including 27% who visit several times daily.

Additionally, the report revealed that many teens feel attached to social media with over half (54%) saying it would be difficult to give up social media. At the same time, just 36% of teens are concerned they spend too much time on social media.

For more findings, read the full report from the Pew Research Center here.

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Twitter Adds ‘Location Spotlight’ To Help Users Find Your Store

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Twitter is introducing a new feature called the Location Spotlight that will make it easier for your online fans to become your real-life customers. 

With the Location Spotlight feature, businesses with physical locations can add store details like your address, phone number, store hours, and even a map showing your location. You can also add links to your website or make it possible to quickly call or message your company.

New Name For Wide Release

This feature is not entirely new to the platform. However, this is the first time many brands will have access to the profile module. 

Twitter tested much of this feature with a small number of well-known professional accounts, calling it the ‘About Module’ at the time. Now, Twitter is bringing this tool (and its new name)  to all businesses with professional Twitter accounts.

How To Get Access

Once you are eligible, update your Location Spotlight by following these steps

  1. Select ‘Edit Profile’
  2. Find and click the ‘Edit professional profile’ button near the bottom of the page
  3. Select ‘Profile Spotlight’
  4. Enter your business details (including your address, hours, website, and contact info)
  5. Select ‘Publish’ to save and display these details on your profile.
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86% of Businesses Say B2B Influencer Marketing Is Successful For Their Brand

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A new comprehensive report from TopRank Marketing indicates that B2B influencer marketing is more effective than many would have expected.

The 60-page report includes survey data, case studies, and information collected through extensive analytics analysis. 

Among all this information is the finding that 86% of B2B businesses report being successful in using influencer marketing to reach their goals. Specifically, the survey found that:

  • 86% of businesses say influencer marketing is moderately or very successful
  • 72% say it helped improve their brand reputation
  • 70% say it improved brand awareness
  • 56% say it drove new leads
  • 33% say it generated revenue for their company

B2B Influencers Aren’t Your Usual Influencers

These findings might surprise many business owners who are imagining a TikTok star promoting manufacturing equipment or professional services.

As the survey makes clear, though, the most effective B2B influencers are often not the figures with the biggest follower or subscriber counts.

“Audience size matters less than audience relevance. The sheer number of followers isn’t as important to marketers as relevance, credibility and expertise. Those with a large audience can help with the reach of a campaign, but it’s vital to include more influential people with smaller audiences.”

Instead, the most effective partnerships with influencers are those who are seen as industry experts or professionals with personal experience in your industry. According to the survey results, B2B companies partner with influencers who are:

  • Industry experts and analysts (77%)
  • Internal executives (56%)
  • Niche experts (48%)
  • Customers (46%)
  • Professional influencers (45%)
  • Employees (42%)
  • Prospects (12%)

The importance of only partnering with influencers who are relevant to your field or audience is also reflected in the answers to what qualities are most important for B2B influencer marketing:

  • Relevance of audience (98%)
  • Audience sees them as trustworthy (87%)
  • Subject matter expertise (78%)
  • Values align with the brand (69%)
  • Influencer publishes on at least one platform (65%)
  • Ability to create content (54%)
  • Size of audience (49%)
  • Professional credentials (42%)
  • Advocate for our brand (33%)

What Types of Influencer Marketing Are Most Effective

As for what types of content brands are making with influencers, the results clearly favored webinars, though other content like social media or blog posts were also popular with brands:

  • Webinars (81%)
  • Social media (74%)
  • Blog posts (71%)
  • Recorded video (67%)
  • Interviews (62%)
  • Podcasts (52%)
  • Live video (48%)
  • Case studies (38%)
  • Industry (33%)
  • Interactive content (31%)
  • Third-party analyst (29%)
  • Social audio (22%)
  • Infographics (17%)

For more, you can get the full 60-page report for free here.

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Even The Head of Instagram Says The New Redesign is ‘Not Yet Good’

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Since it started testing a new fullscreen redesign, Instagram has come under heavy criticism from users – including high-profile figures like the Kardashians. 

Now, in a recent video, Head of Instagram Adam Mosseri seems to agree that the new design is not delivering the quality experience the company had hoped for.

In the video shared on Twitter, Mosseri explained the redesign is “not yet good” and that the new layout will likely see some revisions before it becomes the default for all users. 

However, Mosseri also emphasized that the platform will not be backing away from its current direction. Recommended posts and a new emphasis on video are going to be major parts of the final redesign despite the public demand to “make Instagram Instagram again.”

More Changes Are Likely

The ongoing test has made quite a splash, but it is actually only being shown to a relatively small number of users.  While it captures what Instagram is trying to achieve, it is not up to the standards of the company.

“It’s a test to a few percentage of people out there, and the idea is that a more full-screen experience, not only for videos but for photos, might be a more fun and engaging experience. But I also want to be clear. It’s not yet good, and we’re going to have to get it to a good place if we’re going to ship to the rest of the Instagram community.”

Photos Aren’t Going Anywhere

Much of the anger about the new layout comes from the opinion that Instagram is becoming too much like TikTok by prioritizing video content. 

Though Mosseri emphasizes the platform is always going to be a photo-sharing app at its core, it also needs to grow and expand.

“I want to be clear — we’re going to continue to support photos. It’s part of our heritage. I love photos and I know a lot of you out there love photos too. That said, I need to be honest, I do believe that more and more of Instagram is going to become video over time. We see this even if we change nothing.

We see this even if you just look at chronological feed. If you look at what people share on Instagram that’s shifting more and more to videos over time. If you look at what people like and consume and view on Instagram, that’s also shifting more and more to video over time even when we stop changing anything. So we’re going to have to lean into that shift while continuing to support photos.”

Recommended Posts Are Staying In Your Feed

Another major complaint from users revolves around the inclusion of recommended content in the main feed. 

Recommended posts show content from other users you don’t currently follow. The inclusion of this type of content upset many users who found the recommended content irrelevant or poor-quality. 

Though these recommended posts are going to be sticking around, Mosseri said it is a work in progress and offered tips on how to improve the quality of recommendations:

“Recommendations are posts in your feed from accounts that you do not follow. The idea is to help you discover new and interesting things on Instagram that you might not know even exist. “It’s a test to a few percentages of people out there.”

Now, if you’re seeing things in your feed that are recommendations that you’re not interested in, that means we’re doing a bad job ranking, and we need to improve. And you can X out a recommendation, you can even snooze all recommendations for up to a month or go to your ‘following’ feed.

But we’re going to continue to try to get better at recommendations because we think it’s one of the most effective and important ways to help creators reach more people. We want to do our best by creators, particularly small creators, and we see recommendations as one of the best ways to reach a new audience and grow their following.”

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