Snapchat Rolls Out Add Me URLs: This Week in Social Media

Welcome to our weekly edition of what's hot in social media news.

To help you stay up to date with social media, here are some of the news items that caught our attention.

Snapchat Makes Adding People Easier With Profile URLs: Users can copy their "unique URL or instantly share it through other apps like Twitter" and in places such as email signatures. When tapped on a mobile device, the URL "opens a preview of your profile on Snapchat with an 'Add' button."

"You can copy your unique URL or instantly share it through other apps like Twitter."

Facebook Broadens Audience Network to Support Mobile Web: "The Audience Network is expanding to include support for mobile web, bringing the value of native ad formats and people-based marketing to a new set of publishers."

Facebook offers publishers "fully customizable native units… that showcase multiple images to create unique ad experiences that match the look and feel of their mobile website."

Twitter Launches Enhanced Video Player and Auto-Looping GIFs: Twitter introduced "a new custom video player in Twitter Kit" and announced that GIFs will "receive special treatment with a unique badge (showing "GIF") and auto-looping playback to maximize your users' viewing pleasure."

"Duration and GIF badges seen on preview images."

Periscope for iPhone Broadcasts Live With GoPro: "You can broadcast from your GoPro HERO 4 directly to Periscope for iPhone."

"Once you're live, you can double tap to switch between your GoPro and iPhone cameras."

YouTube Rolls Out Donation Cards: YouTube "began rolling out donation cards to US creators, which let your subscribers and viewers donate directly from your videos."

Facebook Expands Live Video to More Users: Facebook announced it will "expand the ability to share live video to everyone in the U.S. via iPhone" and plans to roll out this service "to the rest of the world over the coming weeks."

Facebook is "expanding live video to more people" on iPhone in the U.S. and plans to roll it out worldwide "over the coming weeks."

Vine Launches Trends Page: The new Trends page "makes it easy for you to discover and dig into the stories behind some of our most notable trends" on Vine.

"This new site makes it easy for you to discover and dig into the stories behind some of our most notable trends."

In this blab from January 29, 2016, Michael Stelzner and guests discuss the top news in social media. Topics include new features and upcoming changes to Snapchat (1:48), Facebook's Community Update (16:56), top executives leaving Twitter (31:30) and Facebook Audience Optimization for Pages (42:34). Subscribe to future shows here.

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In this episode tech and tools expert Steve Dotto explores 3 Tools to Simplify Common Facebook Ad Problems.

Simplify your social and build your business in just 10 minutes a week by subscribing to future shows here.

Peach Releases New Features: Peach added new features including "Magic Words, Bios, Search, Favorites, Animated Shouts, and more."

Foursquare Introduces Trip Tips: Trip Tips is a "new travel planner, designed to take the stress out of your vacation planning time."

Trip Tips on Foursquare provides "a new way to plan travel with help from friends."

Facebook Shares Q4 and Full-Year 2015 Results: Facebook announced its daily active users figure has grown to "1.04 billion on average" and the number of mobile daily active users has soared to "934 million on average."

Facebook shared its "quarterly results and shared an update on our community's progress to connect the world."

Yahoo Redesigns Homepage and App Around Content and Social Sharing: Yahoo rolled out "new updates to the Yahoo app and homepage in the U.S." that make it "easier to discover and create conversations with a community around engaging content and follow the latest developing stories in a nearly infinite news stream."

How Consumers Really Use Snapchat: A survey from NewsCred and Column Five found that Snapchat users share nearly 9,000 snaps every second. Fifty-four percent of those surveyed use the site daily and 32% use it two to five times a week. Because of this high level of engagement, 30% of marketers are including Snapchat in Super Bowl marketing campaigns. However, most Snapchat users say they "rarely" or "never" interact with the branded features of the platform, Snap Live Stories (55%), Discover Stories (84%) or branded filters (60%). Additionally, users are not interested in seeing ads or celebrities on Snapchat. Eighty-seven percent say they "never" buy something advertised on Snapchat. Sixty-four percent do not follow any celebrities on Snapchat.

2016 Edelman Trust Barometer: Edelman conducted an online survey across 28 countries on which industries, information sources and spokespeople are the most trusted among consumers. The study indicates that online search engines continue to top traditional media when it comes to delivering general news and information. The gap is even higher among Millennials, 66% of whom trust search engines (versus 63% of the general 18+ population overall) against 58% trusting traditional media. As far as spokespeople, the study shows that technical experts (67%) are the most trusted by the general population, followed by academic experts (64%) and peers (63%).

2016 Marketing Trends Survey: According to newly released survey data from Selligent and StrongView, marketing budgets continue to rise with 56% of companies increasing theirs in 2016 and 35% planning to maintain their current levels. Email marketing (60%) remains the top channel attracting increased investment, followed by social media (56.3%) and display ads (55.9%). Mobile marketing spend is also expected to climb for a slight majority (51.9%) of respondents as well.

2016 New Year Outlook Survey: RSW/US surveyed 165 senior-level marketers at brands and 115 executives at marketing agencies to explore "troubling trends" marketers frequently mention about agencies, spending expectations and shifts across traditional, digital and mobile media.

Join 3,000 fellow marketers at the mega-conference designed to inspire and empower you with social media marketing ideas: Social Media Marketing World, brought to you by Social Media Examiner.

You'll rub shoulders with the biggest names and brands in social media, soak up countless tips and new strategies and enjoy extensive networking opportunities in San Diego, California.

Discover the newest and best ways to market your business with expert-led sessions and workshops covering social tactics, social strategy, content marketing, measurement, corporate social and social customer service.

Click here to see what all the buzz is about.

What do you think of Snapchat's new profile URLs? Have you tried sharing your unique Snapchat URL to your audiences on other social channels? Please share your comments below.

Snapchat Add Me URLs and other social media news for January 30, 3016.

View the original article here

Original source: Snapchat Rolls Out Add Me URLs: This Week in Social Media.
http://www.jretechnology.com

How to Curate a Roundup Blog Post of Industry Influencers

Do you want more exposure for your blog?

Have you tried curating articles written by influencers?

Roundup posts help you gain the attention of influencers who can increase the reach of your content.

In this article I'll share five steps to creating a curated blog post.

Discover how to create a curated blog post of influencers in your industry.

To select a subject for your post, start by researching popular topics covered by your competitors.

Make a list of three to five individuals or companies that share your area of expertise. Then, go to Buzzsumo.com, type in the name or URL for each competitor and click search. The results let you see their most successful articles.

For example, a search of Social Media Examiner shows two of their most successful posts are about tools.

Search Buzzsumo to find what popular content already exists on competitors' blogs in your industry.

After you search a few more companies, identify a common topic you want to feature in a curated post.

After you choose your subject, strategically target experts to feature in the blog post.

First, go over to Followerwonk, click on Search Bios and enter your topic keyword. This free tool lets you see the most influential Twitter users relative to your topic or keyword.

Go to the Search Bios section on Followerwonk to find specific Twitter users who are experts on your topic.

Next, click the Social Authority tab to sort your list by who has the most influence. Ideally you want to target individuals with high authority and a large number of followers. I suggest individuals rather than companies, since people tend to be more responsive.

For instance, on the topic of social media tools Ian Cleary has a high social authority and a large Twitter following.

Click Social Authority to see who has the most influence on your topic.

Finally, go back to Buzzsumo. This time, run a search for your topic. This is how you find the most popular blogs and authors on the subject.

Type your topic into Buzzsumo's search, and find the most popular blogs and bloggers to target.

Compile a list of 5 to 15 of these influencers, including their blog URL, and move on to the next step.

Once you know which influencers to target, you need to find the most popular content they've published on your topic.

Paste each influencer's blog URL into Buzzsumo search and look for a popular article that relates to the subject of your article.

Enter a URL into Buzzsumo's search to find the expert's most shared content.

If you cannot find any relevant content from the author, don't panic. Type the topic keywords after the URL and search again.

Add keywords after the URL to refine the search results.

Make sure you read all of the articles (you may even want to make notes for later) and gather a nice cross-section of articles without any overlap. You're curating content from these influencers to share with your audience, so you want to create as valuable an article as possible.

When you're done researching, choose one article written by each influencer on your list to feature in your roundup post.

Now it's time to construct your roundup blog post. Use the following blog post structure to increase the likelihood of getting shares from the influencers you mention.

Headline & Introduction

Start with a strong headline to drive clicks to your blog. Here are some headline formulas you can adapt for your roundup:

X Most Popular [TOPIC] Posts From the Pros in [MONTH/YEAR]X Most Popular [TOPIC] Posts From [JOB TITLE] in [MONTH/YEAR]X Most Popular [TOPIC] Posts That Will [DESIRED RESULT]X Most Popular [TOPIC] Posts That Will [DESIRED RESULT] in [DESIRED TIME]

Next, tell your readers what they will learn from your article. Keep the introduction short, punchy and to the point.

Featured Blog Mention

Title and Rank: Start with the numbered position of the article (#1, #2, #3, etc.). Then add the original post title and the amount of shares it received. Compile all the articles into your roundup blog post, using this structure.

Images: Gather and insert the logo, an eye-catching image of the header from the featured blog and a screen grab of the Buzzsumo share count for the original blog post.Attribution: It's essential to fully credit the website that posted the original article and cite the author. For example:Original Article: 7 Strategies for Growing Your Community Blog (ProBlogger). Author: Darren Rowse ( @Problogger) from ProBlogger.Short Description: Write a brief description of each post (about a paragraph), outlining why someone should read it and what they will discover.

Repeat these steps until you've included all of the blogs you're featuring.

Call to Action

Decide what action you want readers to take once they've read the article, and include it at the end of your article. For instance, ask readers to share, comment, subscribe, download, sign up, etc.

Review your article when it's complete, and when you're satisfied, hit Publish.

Reaching out to the influencers you featured gives them the chance to share your article. Their amplification of your content can be a fundamental factor in its success. You'll want to start interacting with the influencers you mention at least a few weeks before you publish the post linking to their content.

There are a variety of ways to do this. For instance, share their content across social platforms, add thoughtful comments to their blog and social media posts, share links to their blog and tag them when you do so, connect with them on social media and sign up for their newsletter.

Once your blog post is live, send each influencer an email to let them know they've been featured in your curated article. Write a nice, genuine letter, sharing your enthusiasm for their work and excitement about your article.

Here's an example:

Send an email to the mentioned influencers, letting them know you included their content in your post.

You'll also want share your post on social media and tag each influencer when you do. Maybe send each influencer a direct tweet with a link to the roundup post to let them know they have been featured.

Mention the included influencers in your tweets, and they will likely respond and retweet.

Hit the right notes and featured influencers may share your content with their audiences, giving your blog more exposure.

Influencers who share your content will extend your reach.

Conclusion

Creating a curated roundup blog post is an excellent way to get on the radar of key influencers in your industry and introduce yourself to their audiences. I've used a variety of blog formats and without a doubt this one is the most effective. It dramatically increases the reach of your posts, while helping you build relationships with the experts in your field. Give it a try.

What do you think? Have you written curated blog posts? How do you find influencers to target? What methods do you have for writing and sharing your posts? Please share your thoughts and experience in the comments.

Tips to curate an influencer roundup post for your blog.

View the original article here

Original source: How to Curate a Roundup Blog Post of Industry Influencers.
http://www.jretechnology.com

Facebook Pages Can Reply to Comments Privately: This Week in Social Media

Welcome to our weekly edition of what's hot in social media news.

To help you stay up to date with social media, here are some of the news items that caught our attention.

Facebook Rolls Out Private Message Page Replies: Facebook released "an update to [the] Pages/Graph API which will allow a Page to reply to a comment on a post with a private message."

"When a Page responds to a comment left on a post with a private message, a direct messaging session will be opened… and the message will include a link to the comment for reference."

Facebook Updates News Feed Algorithm to Show More Relevant Posts: Based on user feedback from a Feed Quality Panel, Facebook is ranking the stories "people might take action on, and which people might want to see near the top of their News Feed." Watch for commentary from Michael Stelzner on this update in the Morning Social Media Marketing Talk replay below.

Instagram Extends Video Ads to 60 Seconds: Instagram "began running its first 60-second video ads, starting with T-Mobile and Warner Brothers."

Facebook and Instagram to Run Longer De-Duped Campaigns: Marketers can now "book reach and frequency campaigns up to 90 days in length on Facebook and Instagram."

Twitter Updates Homepage to Reach Logged-out Users: Twitter is rolling out a "home timeline to people across 23 countries who visit the twitter.com homepage on their mobile devices" and is making it easier for them "to discover stories and conversations happening on Twitter without signing in."

Today we're bringing Tweets to more people around the ?? on our homepage: https://t.co/VIVfJCt2PU pic.twitter.com/C0htvdamPn

— Twitter (@twitter) February 2, 2016

In this blab from February 5, 2016, Michael Stelzner and guests discuss the top news in social media. Topics include the new private message page reply feature on Facebook (2:20), updates to Twitter (15:58) and the latest changes to the Facebook news feed (31:41). Subscribe to future shows here.

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In this episode tech and tools expert Steve Dotto explores How to Streamline YouTube Publishing with TubeBuddy.

Simplify your social and build your business in just 10 minutes a week by subscribing to future shows here.

WhatsApp Grows to One Billion Users Worldwide: "That's nearly one in seven people on Earth who use WhatsApp each month to stay in touch with their loved ones, their friends and their family."

LinkedIn Rolls Out New Lynda.com Course Page: "With over 4,200 courses on Lynda.com, the redesigned course page will help you get where you want to go faster and more efficiently."

"The new player is optimized for faster playback and easier access to controls."

Facebook Shares Examples of 360 Video for Sports: Facebook shares examples of "how 360 videos can give viewers a new way of looking at sports."

Army/Navy in 360The Army/Navy game is a surreal experience in person.

This 360 video will make you feel like you're there.

Posted by CBS Sports on Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Twitter Experiments With Trending Tweets by Topic in the Timeline: Twitter is testing grouping and highlighting "tweets on a trending topic" in users' timelines.

Instagram Tests Multiple Account Switching on iOS: "Instagram confirmed it's running a test involving multiple account switching on iOS." Instagram already began testing this feature on Android "with members of its Instagram beta test group" late last year.

YouTube Red Will Premier First Original Programming: "In addition to getting all of YouTube uninterrupted and a premium YouTube Music experience, a YouTube Red membership will now give you exclusive access to new original series and movies."

A Year in Search and YouTube in Rewind: Google's annual A Year in Search and YouTube in Rewind report examines the defining trends of 2015 based on searches on Google and YouTube, and shares what these insights mean for marketers. The report especially highlights "micro-moments" that occur when people act on a need with intent, immediacy and within a certain context. Micro-moments are seen as rich opportunities for brands to engage with consumers.

2016 Creative Trends: With information gathered from millions of searches and downloads, Shutterstock's annual Creative Trends report shares the visual trends throughout the world. The report also explores the trends around culture, social sharing, design elements and music.

Video Marketing Statistics 2016: According to a recent survey from Wyzowl, a large majority (97%) of U.S. consumers are willing to share a video from a brand with their friends on social media and 70% say they have done so in the past. When asked what motivates them to share a brand video, 76% reported that they would be open to sharing if the video is entertaining. Other reasons mentioned were if it's of interest to their followers (69%), informative (65%) or inspirational (55%).

The Social Media Audit: Talkwalker analyzed and compared the social media presence of 10 of the largest global professional services firms to determine how other B2B companies can make the most of their social media efforts. The case study examined engagement, effective post topics and most popular content types.

Display Ad Viewability and Engagement: Mediative conducted an eye-tracking study to determine how consumers view display ads. Data from the study was used to generate heat maps showing the length of time spent looking at various parts of web pages, as well as gaze maps indicating where people clicked.

How Social Media Video Changed in 2015: Socialbakers examined the past year's most successful videos to determine the top trends that drove social marketing and trends that will likely continue to drive social marketing in 2016. This study focused on the top platforms for video publishing and the video types that drove the most engagement by platform.

Join 3,000 fellow marketers at the mega-conference designed to inspire and empower you with social media marketing ideas: Social Media Marketing World, brought to you by Social Media Examiner.

You'll rub shoulders with the biggest names and brands in social media, soak up countless tips and new strategies and enjoy extensive networking opportunities in San Diego, California.

Discover the newest and best ways to market your business with expert-led sessions and workshops covering social tactics, social strategy, content marketing, measurement, corporate social and social customer service.

Click here to see what all the buzz is about.

What do you think of the new private reply feature on Facebook pages? Have you tried responding to your customers in this way? Please share your comments below.

Facebook Pages Can Reply to Comments Privately and other social media news for February 6, 2016.

View the original article here

Original source: Facebook Pages Can Reply to Comments Privately: This Week in Social Media.
http://www.jretechnology.com

How to Advertise on LinkedIn

Are you looking for more leads from LinkedIn?

Want to use LinkedIn ads to help?

LinkedIn's advertising platform lets you reach highly targeted groups of professionals with your customer acquisition message.

In this article you'll discover how to use LinkedIn ads to reach the most relevant professional audiences for your business.

Discover how to reach your target professional audience using advertising on LinkedIn.

Using the self-service LinkedIn Ads platform, you can create two types of ads: sponsored updates and text ads. Both of these allow you to send visitors to your website. The differences between the two are where they are displayed and how you create them.

Below you can see one sponsored update in the LinkedIn news feed in the red box and three text ads in the blue box.

You can create text ads and sponsored updates from the LinkedIn Ads platform.

In terms of actions, people who see the sponsored update can click through to the advertiser's website using the link and the image in the update, click through to the advertiser's LinkedIn company page or showcase page or follow the advertiser's LinkedIn company or showcase page.

For text ads, people can only click through to the advertiser's website using the link and the image in the ad.

Because the cost of LinkedIn ads tends to run higher than other social platforms like Facebook and Twitter, you'll want to monitor your analytics vigilantly. If you use UTM parameters with your URLs and Google Analytics with either ad format, you'll ensure that you're getting conversions for your ad budget.

Now, let's look at how you can create these types of ads on LinkedIn.

To create a sponsored update, visit the LinkedIn Campaign Manager. You'll need an account linked to your LinkedIn company page or showcase page to create a sponsored update. If you already have one, you can click on your account from the list.

You need an account linked to your LinkedIn company or showcase page to create a sponsored update.

If you don't see an account in your Campaign Manager, you'll need to click the Add Account button to create one.

Fill in the details to add an account.

After you select your account, click on the Create Campaign button.

Click the Create Campaign button.

Then select Sponsored Updates.

Select Sponsored Updates.

Next, enter a name for your campaign. Then either choose an update to sponsor from your company page or showcase page, or click the link to Create New Sponsored Content.

Choose an update to sponsor.

If you choose to sponsor an update that has already been posted to your company or showcase page, you won't have the option to edit it. If you choose to create new sponsored content instead, you can customize an update that will be seen only by your target audience.

You have the option to create new sponsored content.

You can create one or more new updates to use as variations for your sponsored update campaign. This allows you to see whether you get better results from link posts, photo posts, posts with certain text or posts with certain images.

Create one or more new updates to use as variations for your sponsored update campaign.

These updates also appear on a special tab for Direct Sponsored Content on your company page or showcase page. Any content on this tab is shown only to you and your target ad audiences. You can use the Direct Sponsored Content tab to monitor engagement with the posts in terms of likes and comments.

Your updates appear on the Direct Sponsored Update tab on your company or showcase page.

After you configure your target audience and budget (which I'll show you after we look at the text ad configuration), you'll launch your campaign. If you chose multiple variations, you can view them to see which ones perform best once your campaign goes live. Ultimately you can toggle the underperforming ones off.

See which ad variation performed best.

To create a text ad, visit the LinkedIn Campaign Manager. You can do so under a personal account not linked to a company page or showcase page, or you can choose to add an account linked to your company page or showcase page.

To create a text ad, you can use a personal account not linked to a company or showcase page.

Once you select your account, click on the Create Campaign button.

Click Create Campaign.

Then select Text Ads.

Select the Text Ads option.

Next, enter a name for your campaign and then start configuring your text ad.

Configure your text ad.

You can choose to direct visitors to your page on LinkedIn or to a URL on your website. Then add an image, a 25-character headline and a 75-character description. You can see a preview of your text ad on the right side of the page.

Add an image, headline, and description for your ad.

Once you save your first text ad, you have the option to create up to 14 additional versions (totaling 15 text ads) to use for testing purposes. This allows you to see whether you get better results from different images, headlines or descriptions.

Create additional versions of your ad to use for testing.

After you configure your target audience and budget (which I'll show you in the following sections), you can launch your campaign. As with sponsored updates, if you chose multiple variations, you can determine which ones perform best and ultimately toggle the underperforming ones off.

See which ad variations performed best.

Audience targeting options for both sponsored updates and text ads are the same. Once you've configured your sponsored updates or text ads, you'll see the following audience targeting options.

Select targeting criteria.

To get started, select the locations you want to include or exclude. Then you have the option to target your audience with a variety of professional traits: company name, company industry, company size, job title, job function, job seniority, school, fields of study, degrees, skills, LinkedIn group membership, gender and age.

As you select certain criteria, you'll see your estimated target audience size change in the right sidebar. You may also notice that you won't be able to select related criteria. For example, if you select Company Name, you won't be able to select Company Industry or Company Size. Likewise, if you select Job Title, you won't be able to select Job Function or Job Seniority.

At the bottom, you also have the option to include similar audiences through Audience Expansion (audiences similar to those you've targeted) and reach audiences beyond the LinkedIn news feed (audiences of LinkedIn partners).

If you prefer to reach only the people you've specified in your targeting or people in the LinkedIn news feed, you can uncheck both of these boxes. If you leave them checked, your ad budget will likely be completed faster.

Once you've configured your target audience, you'll set your ad campaign's budget. You can choose between cost per click (CPC) and cost per impression (CPM) based on whether you want to pay for results or exposure.

Set your ad budget.

From this screen, you can also configure your suggested bid, daily budget, total budget and when to run your campaign.

To review your ad campaign's analytics, visit your LinkedIn Campaign Manager and click on the campaigns you want to review.

From the view below, you can see a quick comparison of ad performance between sponsored update and text ad campaigns.

Review your campaign's analytics.

You can also use the links to see data specific to social actions and budget.

Click the links to see data specific to social actions and budget.

When you click through to each campaign, you'll be able to see the performance of different variations of ads within each campaign. You can edit your ads, audience targeting and budget if needed, as well as review your analytics. Be sure to monitor these often and toggle the campaigns and ad variations on and off according to performance.

In Conclusion

If you're looking to target a strictly professional audience, LinkedIn Ads is definitely a platform to try.

What do you think? Do you use LinkedIn Ads? If so, please share your experiences and results in the comments!

Tips about how to use targeted LinkedIn Ads to reach your professional audience.

View the original article here

Original source: How to Advertise on LinkedIn.
http://www.jretechnology.com