Facebook Re-Vamps Trending News Section in Response to Recent Controversy

Earlier this year, a report from Gizmodo suggested that Facebook had been selectively editing their Trending News section to highlight or ignore certain stories, indicative of inherent bias in their news coverage.

Such an accusation would be significant in any context, but given Facebook's massive global reach (now up to 1.71 billion users), the platform is now in a position where it arguably has more influence over how people access news content than any other platform. Such emphasis becomes even more relevant when you consider that, according to Pew Research, more Americans than ever are getting their news via Facebook.

Gizmodo's report sparked an internal investigation at Facebook HQ, sparked calls for an official Government inquiry and lead to CEO Mark Zuckerberg meeting with conservative groups to explain their processes. Facebook released their official guidelines on how they select trending topics and responded publicly to alleviate concerns. Their investigation, meanwhile, found no evidence of systematic bias – but still, the seeds had been planted.  Public doubt had been raised.

The issue highlighted just how influential Facebook has become, and the significance of the role it plays in the wider media process. In fact, it's not even theory that Facebook has the capacity to influence how people think, or even how they vote, they've actually proven such influence is possible, as part of an experiment back in 2010. And given this heightened concern, Facebook, has effectively been forced to act.

That's why, today, The Social Network has announced a change in the way their Trending News section is presented.

In a post on the Facebook Newsroom blog, Facebook's outlined how manual descriptions will now be removed from the Trending list, leaving just a simplified topic and the number of people talking about it.

When you hover over any topic on the list, you'll be given more context as to what the story is about, with an automatically selected top match story preview.

And as normal, if you click through on any topic, you'll be taken to a search results page which will include a list of the news sources covering the issue

"As before, articles and posts that appear in search results are surfaced algorithmically, based on a high volume of mentions and a sharp increase in mentions over a short period of time."

The trending list will also remain personalized and matched to you based on your interests, your location and previously read Trending content.

Facebook also notes that humans will still have some involvement in the process:

"There are still people involved in this process to ensure that the topics that appear in Trending remain high-quality — for example, confirming that a topic is tied to a current news event in the real world. The topic #lunch is talked about during lunchtime every day around the world, but will not be a trending topic. These changes mean that we no longer need to do things like write topic descriptions and short story summaries since we're relying on an algorithm to pull excerpts directly from news stories."

The change effectively reduces the influence of Facebook's human editors on the Trending section – and while that doesn't completely eliminate the possibility that these topics could still be manually interfered with, it does give the editorial team less impetus to do so, reducing their impact on what's trending and relying instead on algorithms to surface relevant content.

In essence, now, Facebook's Trending Topics is exactly like Twitter's "Trends" section.

For their part, Facebook says that this level of automation has always been the plan – by relying on automated trending topics, they can make this section more relevant to users around the world, rather than having to hire more and more local editors to produce summaries. But it's pretty clear that the move has been inspired by the recent controversy.

Some have already derided Facebook for taking a step backwards with the change, as providing that additional context made their Trending section more useful, but really, the update seems minor.

But then again the proof, of course, will come in practice – will this change result in more people clicking on Trending stories because the single word trends will intrigue them? Or will it lead to more people simply ignoring the section because it provides no context for the mention? As Facebook works to become a bigger part of the news cycle, through getting publishers to post more content direct to its site, it's an interesting gamble to take, though the option has been in testing for a few weeks, so they're obviously fairly confident the impact will be minimal, if any.

Either way you look at it, Facebook is an influential news source, and as such, it's crucially important for them to inspire trust. This announcement is another move to reinforce that element.  

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Original source: Facebook Re-Vamps Trending News Section in Response to Recent Controversy.
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The Value of Social Proof in Marketing

Have you caught the Pokémon Go fever yet?

If so, you're not alone. Since its July 6th launch, over 15 million daily users have downloaded the app on their smartphones – to put that in perspective, that's more daily users than Spotify or Pandora.

Even more incredible, the game is attracting a diverse group of first-time players that are new to the Pokémon universe.

So what's driving the interest in a kid's game based on a decades-old media franchise?

The answer is social proof.

Social Proof refers to the psychological phenomenon when one's perception of correct social behavior is heavily influenced by the actions of others. Although the concept may seem complex, it's actually a common human reaction to things we see in our everyday lives. For example, when you look to try a new restaurant based on the hundreds of rave reviews. Or, in the case of Pokémon Go, the desire to download an app that you normally wouldn't after seeing dozens of your friends and family play it.

Social proof works because it's based on our need to belong. So when you're going to see the latest box office blockbuster, you're actually doing more than taking in a movie. You're actually joining a group that have shared the same experience.

When used correctly, social proof can be an excellent way to grow your personal or professional brand on social media. For best results, it needs to be leveraged by a trusted influencer who has built (either formally or informally) a community in which others would like to be a part of.

It's important to note that the influencer doesn't always have to be a celebrity with millions of followers on Twitter either. Instead, the person simply needs have a loyal following that would be open to suggestions regarding things that are of importance to them.

Building that type of loyalty takes steady engagement with their audience. This means not just sharing content that's relevant to the brand, but also involving the community in conversations across the social networking platforms, thereby, reinforcing their credibility among their fans.

The type of content shared can be just as powerful as the influencer sharing them.

When creating materials to share with your audience, there are basically five categories of social proof content that works best.

Expert opinions – Sharing reviews of a new tech product from CNETCelebrity endorsements – Showing pictures of stars using your product or serviceUser testimonials and reviews – Such as a vlog or a blog post offering ravesPeer based content – Sharing through tweets feedback from family and friendsCrowd based content – Live-streaming waiting in line for the newest Jordans or iPhone

For each type of content, it's important to incorporate a call to action. Not only will this allow you to accurately measure how effective your content marketing is, but it can also provide a way to change your approach based on feedback from your audience.

The call to action can be something as simple as sharing a discount code to try the product, however, like with any form of marketing-you must have a solid way to track the campaign from beginning to end.

If you're successful with your social proof marketing efforts, you'll be able to capture the loyalty and respect of your target audience. People, who in turn, will be able to influence others.

Sort of like catching a Pikachu.

Social proof is the psychological phenomenon that's built on creating desired behavior based on the perceived actions of others. If done well, it's an excellent way to leverage a consumer's need of belonging in order to grow your brand.

In order for it to be effective, you should have a community built around a trusted influencer who regularly engages with their audience.

The post Social Proof in Marketing originally from Bryan Kramer | Renowned global speaker, best-selling author and trainer.

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Original source: The Value of Social Proof in Marketing.
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Pinterest Raises the Video Marketing Bar, and Here’s How You Can Clear It

Pinterest has put their newest feature into literal motion with the release of Promoted Videos. Now, businesses and Pinners alike can get ready to set sail on an unprecedented journey of consumer engagement.

In case you haven't heard, Pinterest is testing the new sea of mobile video marketing waters by offering businesses the ability to promote their brand via how-to's, demos, and sneak peeks. But the real wave rider here (and as shown in the example above) is that Pinterest's new video option enables businesses to combine related, easily accessible pins to support their video content, all in one place.

Early testers have shown promising results, with major brands like General Mills' "Old El Paso" reporting significant lifts in engagement metrics, including higher completion rates and a 4x more memorable impression than non-video ads.

The team at Pinterest have really made this feature a business treasure chest, offering pearls at every turn. For instance, videos only play as you're scrolling – when you stop, the video stops. Just like their Cinematic Pin predecessors, viewers can't camp in their home feed and enjoy your video content. To get the full benefit the viewer has to click, which means at the very least you get a measurable impression.

One of the most unique features of this rollout is Pinterest's native video player – no site redirection necessary. Once a Pinner clicks on the video, not only will they get to view and hear the video in its entirety, but also be exposed to six additional related pins displayed right underneath. Businesses can handpick those pins instead of relying on an algorithm of suggestions, which gives a company even more ways to leverage the tool.

When it comes to Promoted Video pins, Pinterest analytics paint a pretty clear picture: They track the number of impressions, number of video views (including the percentage of the video viewed), and the number of clicks your video generated. Like any marketing campaign, you'll need to track your progress so you'll know where to tweak along the way, and your Pinterest analytics dashboard couldn't possibly make that task any easier.

So the next big question is "what's it going to cost?"

Just like the Promoted Pins, which were, introduced last year, you'll have the option of paying on a CPM basis: You bid on a cost-per-thousand impressions and Pinterest will optimize how your ad reaches people. Most people set this around $15-$20.

An impression in this case will be anytime a viewer sees your Video Pin, even if that person never clicks to view your video. You can also set the maximum number of times an individual will see your campaign, so you won't waste impressions on too many repeat viewers.

But bands will need to be prepared to flex their budget muscle – as Ad Age tells us Promoted Videos require a minimum investment of $500,000.

Ready to dive in?

Before you call lights, camera, action for your next brand video, you'll first need to set up a Pinterest Business Account. Only a business account gives you access to features like Promoted Videos, Pin analytics, Promoted Pins, and Buy Now functionality.

If you're new to the platform, take time to craft your Pinterest-specific brand. Check out the best practices and FAQs, learn the lingo, build some boards, garner a following, and fully immerse yourself in the Pintereverse. The more you know about how Pinterest works the better you can leverage the features.

Once you've gotten your business account established and you're ready to promote your videos, you'll need to reach out to a Pinterest account team who'll direct you from there. Currently, only businesses in the US and UK working with an account team can take advantage of Promoted Video pins.

If you're not quite ready to make the monetary commitment, you can still benefit from some form of video capabilities within Pinterest. After you've established your business account, you can share your video content as regular pins, though you lose the functionality that accompanies the Promoted Videos. Your video will appear organically as a static image in a news feed and won't feature your handpicked content underneath.

As the social markets continue to shift, it looks like video is here to stay. Early adopters of social media trends have tended to see bigger benefits than bandwagon fans, but like with anything, it simply takes time. So stay engaged, do your homework, but don't wait too long to take action – you could end up missing the boat altogether.

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Original source: Pinterest Raises the Video Marketing Bar, and Here's How You Can Clear It.
http://www.jretechnology.com

20 Content Marketing Resources to Bookmark ASAP

You don't have to tell me about all you have to do.

Planning, creating, and distributing content.

Testing and optimizing it for more conversions, rankings, and shares.

Keeping up with the constantly changing industry and learning about your customers and audience.

And doing all of it well. Over and over.

No wonder marketers love caffeine.

To help you get by, I'm inviting you into my beloved content marketing swipe file. The resources in my bookmarks folder, Pocket feed, and Kindle app – the stuff that helps me be a better content marketer.

From strategy and productivity to lead nurturing and SEO, check out the cheat sheets, ebooks, and guides below to get help where you need it.

Content marketing has a ton of moving parts and different people working together. As most teams can tell you, it doesn't always run so smoothly. This ebook from Uberflip has great advice for improving the whole team's productivity.

From how you structure your team in the first place, to how you build processes and communicate with each other, every aspect of how your team works together impacts your content. Make everything as efficient as possible with Uberflip's help.

These free buyer persona templates from HubSpot are almost as famous as some of HubSpot's massive projects and resources, like their blog or marketing grader. And yet it's just 25-page slide deck, with a good portion of the slides mostly blank.

That says something, right? These make it easy to create buyer personas, even if you've never done so. The templates prompt your team what to think about, consider, identify, and ask about your target personas.

I'm incredibly nitpicky about style and ensuring consistency for all of our content.

It's probably very annoying, but necessary.

That's why I love Kapost's style guide templates that make it possible and easy for every brand to have style guidelines.

Use it to figure out what sections and structure your own brand's guide should have, and follow the prompts to make sure it contains all the information needed to guarantee consistency across all your brand's content.

Sometimes you don't have a whole afternoon to learn new things about content marketing. You'd like the quick and dirty tips, please, not a 50-page guide. That's what this great Onboardly roundup ebook gives you.

It features quick, tweet-length tips from experts like Joel Klettke, Dan Martell, and Jeff Bullas. All just a quick sentence, in (as Onboardly says) "the name of sweet, sweet brevity." Scroll through it for tips on content mapping, creating content, and more.

Media monitoring can help content marketers at every stage – from persona research and strategy planning all the way through to promoting blog posts and engaging readers.

In this ebook by our content team, see how it can be used by some of the content marketers that know media monitoring best (not to brag or anything…). We take you through some of the ways we use our own tool to make content marketing easier, and how you can too.

It's always important to stay up-to-date on content marketing trends and the behavior patterns of audiences, especially in an industry like ours, that moves so fast. This 2016 benchmark report presents Kapost's original research on marketing-driven customer experiences.

The report lays down some important statistics, their own conclusions and findings based on the stats, and how to apply them through keys to success in content marketing. Download it now to help guide your strategy for the rest of the year and beyond.

I'm all about templates, so those first persona resources won't be the only ones appearing on this list. In this Excel templates bundle from HubSpot, get the spreadsheets you need to run your team smoothly, without the normal hours spent tediously putting it together yourself.

The spreadsheets cover marketing necessities like an editorial calendar, goal setting templates, and SEO and PPC planning guides. Your whole team will save time on the regular with this kit.

Before you create a single piece of content, you need to get a few things nailed down, otherwise, those first posts won't support your overall strategy. 

This free content strategy course by Sujan Patel walks you through creating a plan in just a few days. It goes over planning and strategy items like deciding who your audience is and what they want, along with more tactical tips like writing headlines and sharing posts.

Your editorial calendar is the skeleton of your content marketing program. Without a good one, things can tend to fall apart. People don't know what they're doing or when, let alone what needs to be accomplished long-term.

Calendars can be as simple or complex as you'd like, but here's a good calendar template to start from by CoSchedule. Make sure your whole team knows how to find what content's being published when and what needs to be done for it.

Once you have a strategy and editorial calendar ready to go, it's time to dig into more specific research – like looking into specific topics or personas instead of the bird's eye view of them all. Media monitoring comes in handy here.

From seeing what your target audience is talking about to seeing what content your competitors publish, it makes it easier to keep up with all the different social networks and websites you need to keep up with. This monitoring guide talks about exactly how to get started saving time.

You can't cook without the right ingredients and tools, of course, but it all starts with who's handling them – the chefs. No matter how great a strategy you have, it won't succeed with poor content marketers on your team.

Learn how to recruit your content marketing dream team in this hiring handbook from Kapost. Figure out how to structure the team, who to hire first, and what each person should be focusing on. And most importantly, how to all work together seamlessly to build a content machine.

There's no denying HubSpot's content team is a well-oiled machine. They produce high volumes of highly visible and influential content, and it's always great. Have you ever wondered what has to go on behind the scenes to make that happen?

Their content machine ebook explains how they do it, and how they make it look so easy. Hear their strategies for building a culture of content, refining their creation process, and making everything they do more effective.

When you've taken care of the big projects like building a team and creating a content strategy, the real work begins. And that starts with nailing down some topics to create content about. And then coming up with more topics, and then more topics, and then more, because content marketing is a long game.

To keep your creativity flowing and your ideas fresh, this marketing cheat sheet can give you ideas for seeking out inspiration and getting your brain's gears grinding. You'll always have a place to look for more ideas.

The cheat sheet above gives you lots of different ways to look for new ideas. This ebook is similar but takes the opposite approach. It goes over a handful of ways to brainstorm, but it dives deep. Like really deep.

See exactly how expert content marketers plan their content. I spoke to more than 10 other content marketers – all smarter and better than me – and asked them how they keep their editorial calendars full. Here are the full details on their processes and favorite methods, as well as how you can replicate them yourself. You're welcome!

I'd say content outlines are one of the most underrated and underutilized tool content marketers have available to them. Everyone wants to jump right into writing – and I get it, but taking extra time to outline can actually save time on a piece itself.

I find that with my own posts, five minutes of planning and making some quick lists can save at least 15-30 minutes of writing the first draft. Don't believe me? Try CoSchedule's outlining template and see how much time it saves you.

Not all marketers are writers. But nowadays, all marketers are content creators. Even if it's not your main thing, I doubt anyone on your team manages to avoid it completely. And as a content marketer, you probably get thrown into editing it. So you should probably make it for easy for your team to write well…

These writing tips from Onboardly will teach them how to get started writing content, and which resources to turn to for further learning. You definitely want to subtly post it in your marketing team's Slack channel. 

Headlines are like storefronts, front yards, and book covers: they're someone's first impression, and the larger piece of work is judged based on them. They need to be enticing, welcoming, to make people want to check it out further. Meaning, they need to rock.

CoSchedule has made it so easy to write amazing headlines – combine their headline analyzer with this tear sheet of "power words" to write content titles long enough, and it'll get easier and easier to knock out clickworthy content.

Do you put as much effort into promoting content as you do creating it? We all say we do, but let's be real – every content marketer can spend more time on distribution.

Come up with new ways to build traffic – both long- and short-term – to your blog posts (or other content) with the help of our free content promotion printable.

Content syndication and republishing make everything you write for your own blog work twice as hard. If the third-party publications are much larger than yours, it can get even better.

SumoMe has a great guide to growing traffic that includes a free spreadsheet of publications you can pitch, along with the contact info you need to pitch them.

Let's talk more about making content work harder for you. There's a simple way to get content to consistently generate, nurture, and even close leads for you: marketing automation. Marketo's guide explains what it is, how to get started, and why automation is the assistant your sales and marketing teams need.

When you're expected to churn out content on the regular and promote it so that it performs well, sometimes you need a little help.

It's normal to feel stuck, to feel creative blocks. That's not what separates the good content marketers from the bad, but do you know what separates the smart ones from the dumb ones? The awareness to recognize it and figure out how to deal, like with help from any of the resources above.

The post 20 Content Marketing Resources to Bookmark ASAP appeared first on The Mention Blog.

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Original source: 20 Content Marketing Resources to Bookmark ASAP.
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Why Brands Can’t Take a One-Size-Fits-All Approach to Reaching Gen Z [Infographic]

Marketers are buzzing about how to target the nearly 60 million that make up the digital natives known as Generation Z – and it turns out brands will have to really step up their game. Insights from a recent Harris Poll study commissioned by Lithium showed that Gen Z boys, in particular, are more trusting and less patient than their female counterparts, meaning brands will have to forgo easy copy-paste tactics and try to authentically engage with girls to earn them as customers.

The below infographic, created by Lithium, reveals how Gen Z boys and girls differ in their trust of company websites, social networks, paid spokespeople and company experts.

Brands are being called upon to rethink their social media marketing strategies, paying particular attention to how they:

Personalize their approachTalk WITH their customers and not AT themLeverage influencersMaintain a good mix of organic vs. paid advertisingBe authentic

An entire generation of customers is on the line – avoiding the one-size-fits-all approach will win Gen Z boys and girls over big time.

This post originally appeared on Irfan Ahmad's blog.

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Original source: Why Brands Can't Take a One-Size-Fits-All Approach to Reaching Gen Z [Infographic].
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Power to the Blogger: Why Consumers and Businesses Can’t Afford to Ignore Them

If you browse the web, work in social media, are on social media, or have Googled a simple "how to" question, chances are you've come across a blogger. That may be as much thought as you've given to the blogging world; you know they're out there, and that's great. As a business, however, blogs and bloggers, should not be ignored – in fact, you should be paying more attention to them than ever.

Here's why.

There has been a noticeable shift in consumer behavior that indicates the average person doesn't trust companies.

This is where bloggers come in.

Bloggers are followed because they're someone the reader likes, admires, maybe even aspires to be like, and that, eventually, makes them someone that people trust. Companies, in general, have come to realize that their consumers possess a certain innate distrust for their messages, and more trust for blogs/bloggers, and they've therefore begun to curate successful, fruitful relationships between themselves and the blogosphere, which, in turn, enables them to establish more trust and better relationships between themselves and consumers. This has greatly changed marketing tactics, and even PR.

A blogger doesn't work as a company spokesperson – instead, the good ones give unbiased, honest opinions about products, services, or experiences. It isn't hard to imagine how this can be a successfully leveraged by brands, should the blogger have a strong and active presence and following.

And when businesses are successfully able to utilize their relationship with personal bloggers they end up seeing results – research shows that up to nine in 10 prospective consumers (84%) go on to make purchases after reading about a product or service on a blog.

If your brand is looking to work with an influential blogger, here are a few ideas on how to do it.

Product reviews – Send them free product and ask them to write up their thoughts in a post (note: depending on the clout of the blogger, this may require payment as well as product)Crate a brand ambassador program – Create a loyal army of bloggers by bringing them into the fold as official ambassadors. Pro hack: BuzzStream is a nice tool for organizing influencer/blogger relationshipsLink to blog content – If you find a blogger who's an expert on a topic that relates to one of your products, or your company, share their posts and link to them. There's no shame in providing a nod to other's work. Instead, it humanizes a company and helps establish relationships, credibility, and authorityOrganize exclusive events and involve bloggers – For example, send your product to many relevant bloggers ahead of a public release date and let bloggers build "free" hype for you. An offline example would be to invite them to your company to let them have an experience or service before the public and then write about it, also building hype;Be creative – You can find bloggers that cover just about every niche you can think of, and they're a brilliant bunch of people. So approach them with excitement about their passion and create something extraordinary to get both of your names out thereReach them early – One more tip, try to get in touch with promising bloggers as they're still growing, in order to win their loyalty before they make it too big. They'll be eager to work with you, grateful for being noticed, and you'll be able to facilitate a symbiotic relationship to promote one another in your growth.

Bottom line, businesses, small and large, if you're not tapping into the blogosphere in a serious way, it's time to catch up.

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Original source: Power to the Blogger: Why Consumers and Businesses Can't Afford to Ignore Them.
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5 Steps to Creating a Successful Social Media Strategy for 2017

Social media is constantly evolving and can be hard to predict what's coming next. Who would have guessed that Chewbacca Mom would be so popular, Pokemon Go? We can't know what will be popular in the coming years, however we can set ourselves up for success with some best practices and logical anticipation based on user behavior and industry trends.

Having a solid social media strategy will help you navigate towards business goals through the ever changing social landscape. Check out these five steps to creating a successful social media strategy in 2017.

Have you ever gotten into a car and started driving somewhere without knowing where you want to go? Probably not. Social media marketing is very similar in that you aren't setting yourself up for success if you just "do" things on Facebook or Twitter.

The very first step to creating a successful social media strategy is understanding what your end goal is. It's important to be realistic and set challenging yet achievable goals.

Here are some examples of goals you might want to consider for your social media strategy:

Increase overall traffic to your website by 50% year over yearDrive 60% more engagement year over yearInfluence 30% more conversions year over yearIncrease revenue from social media by 20% year over year.

The above goals are completely random, purely intended to get you thinking of the types of things you might like to accomplish with social media marketing in 2017.

With definitive goals in mind, you can then align everything you do to towards achieving them.

You have your goals clearly defined, now it's time to start thinking about who you'll be trying to activate to achieve these goals.

There are a few different ways to identify your target audience. First, I would recommend taking a look at your current customer base and trying to create demographic personas based on needs, spending and whether you want to keep this current customer base or aim for a different one altogether.

But what if you don't have a large customer base to vet for that ideal audience? No problem – there are tools you can use to see who is naturally gravitating towards your brand via your website and social media channels.

Most social channels offer demographic information, however the below outlines the most helpful process (in my experience) to work out if there's a concentration of your target audience on any respective social channel.

Google Analytics – Google Analytics has some awesome tools to help you understand the demographics, location, interests and even behaviors of your website visitors. Vetting this data for the customers that are converting is a great way to dial in on that desired audience.Facebook Insights / Audience Insights – Facebook is king of the data kingdom and has a wealth of information on users that are connected to your page, visit your website and even engage with your content. Installing a Facebook pixel or uploading an email list will help you unlock this valuable data.Twitter Analytics – Want demographic and lifestyle data on the people following your Twitter account? Accessing Twitter Analytics can provide a ton of useful information and also enables you to compare your followers to a custom persona. If you think your target market is active on Twitter, this is the way to find out.Instagram Analytics – This relatively new set of data will allow you to check out the demographics, content consumption and location of your following. LinkedIn Analytics – LinkedIn analytics have always been a bit flimsy, but if you're in the B2B space, you need to check out this data to understand what kind of community you are building and if it fits your ideal audience and goals.

Leveraging data to identify your target audience has always been important, however when it comes to creating a successful social media strategy in 2017, it's absolutely a must.

Would you believe me if I told you that there are more daily active users on Facebook now than people in existence in 1901? The gap between the amount of content created and the amount of content actually consumed on social sites is rapidly widening, and new media is becoming popular, however there are only so many possible ways to read, listen, and watch. This is precisely why a diverse content strategy will set you up for success in 2017.

Read – In 2017, people are going to want to find information in quick, digestible ways – if you have a blog on your website, you're already ahead of the game. If you can create valuable blog content that's promoted properly through your social media channels, you'll definitely begin to attract your ideal customer to your website. After all, you're writing the content and you control the messaging. Look – 90% of information transmitted to the human brain is visual and our magical minds process visuals 60,000x faster than text. To win attention (and impressions) on social media in 2017 you're going to need to create compelling visuals to tell your story. This doesn't mean you need to be an expert graphic designer (although having a talented professional is encouraged). Sites like Canva can help amateurs create social graphics that are fun, attractive and engaging.Watch – Video is going to be critical to social media success in 2017. Almost every social media site has upgraded their video capabilities and you should follow suit. Videos don't have to be expensive to produce either. Capturing a fun moment or product video can be done with an iPhone and uploaded directly to your platform of choice. Video content statistically gets more engagement than images. Use video in 2017.Listen – Podcasts increased in popularity in 2016 and will likely continue to grow. Currently it's estimated that 17% of Americans listen to monthly podcasts. Could there be an opportunity for your brand with podcasts in 2017?

To truly reach a targeted audience and see a business result from social media, it's highly recommended to allocate a dedicated social media advertising budget.

Within the next five years, social media advertising is expected to comprise over 20% of marketing budgets. 2017 is the year you should take social advertising seriously and invest a strategically used budget. When used intelligently, social advertising is the absolute most cost effective way to reach a targeted audience where they are the most engaged.

If you don't have social media ad spend available currently, get it, otherwise you could get left behind in 2017.

Did you know that it's estimated that people check their phones an average of 150x per day? People are so addicted to their mobile phones that a recent survey showed that 68% of people perceive vibrations when their phone isn't actually getting a notification – people are literally imagining their phone vibrating because their brain constantly expects it.

Since we're all addicted to mobile devices, wouldn't it make sense to tailor your social media strategy in 2017 to be mobile-first? 33% of shoppers do a majority of research on a mobile device and 49% say that they would buy more through their mobile device if the process was easier. Since the consumer journey is no longer linear and takes place across different devices, we should all make 2017 the year that we make our content, social advertisements and website mobile friendly. 80% of social media time is now spent on mobile devices, so not optimizing your social media strategy for mobile could be a huge mistake in 2017.

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Original source: 5 Steps to Creating a Successful Social Media Strategy for 2017.
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What Your Instagram Posts Reveal about Your Mental State (and Why That’s Important)

Instagram has long been known as a place for your best photos, for polished, pristine images that showcase you or your subjects in the best light, as opposed to the more in-the-moment, DIY feel of other networks. That focus on perfection became a point of contention last year when Insta-famous model Essena O'Neill spoke out about the lengths she would go to in order to present a perfect life via her Instagram account. O'Neill even went so far as to go back and edit the captions on her old posts to reflect the actual truth behind her "in the moment" shots.

O'Neill's stance highlighted a growing issue, particularly among younger users – that teens are often succumbing to peer pressure and working to present an unrealistic, and largely unhealthy, view of how they live. That then has a flow-on effect to other teen users who invariably compare their own lives to those being presented via the content of their friends. But what's posted on social, as noted by O'Neill, is very often not representative of people's real life experiences. There are far more posts about triumphs than there are about the struggles that go along with them.

The links between social media and psychology have been examined in many ways – one recent study sponsored by the National Institute for Mental Health identified a "strong and significant association between social media use and depression" among young adults, another by the University of Missouri found that Facebook use, in particular, could be linked to depression, particularly the "surveillance" element, where people use the site to check up on how their friends are doing and compare what they see to their own life. For all the positive benefits that social connectivity brings, the relative links between social media use and psychological concerns are undeniable, at least in some capacity, and when you also consider that suicide is the second leading cause of death for people aged between 10 and 24 in the U.S., the issue takes on even more urgency. Put simply, it's something that we all need to pay attention to and work towards a solution where possible.

In line with this, a new report by researchers from Harvard University and The University of Vermont takes a look at Instagram, specifically, and how the content people post on Instagram can be reflective of their mental state. But rather than examining their findings in an observational capacity, the research team are looking to use the data to detect users in need to assistance by creating an algorithm that can detect mental issues and connect people to relevant support services.

To do this, the researchers asked 166 Instagram users for permission to analyze their posts and also asked whether or not they had a diagnosis of clinical depression from a mental health professional. What they found was that people with depression over-indexed in several categories in regards to their Instagram post composition.

For example, people with depression prefer darker colors and more grays or blues than non-sufferers.

Depressed people also tend to tend to have more comments on their posts, but fewer likes, while they were also less likely to use image filters – though when they did, Inkwell, which makes everything black and white, was their primary option of choice.

The researchers also found that "depressed participants were more likely to post photos with faces, but had a lower average face count per photograph than healthy participants". This is likely indicative of these people having fewer social interactions.

The findings enabled the researchers to build an algorithm that was then used to analyze further Instagram images to determine whether it could detect depressed users based on their posts.

The result?

"When the machine gave a depression marker, it was right about 54% of the time, compared to unassisted primary physicians who correctly make a depression diagnosis about 42% of the time."

And while that level of success may seem low, it's still 25% better than human detection rates, which suggests that such a system, with further training, could one day be able to automatically detect mentally ill patients who may be in need of assistance based on their Instagram posts alone.

This is not the first time such a system has been proposed. A report released by Microsoft in 2013 used Twitter data in the same way, determining that tweet information could detect individuals with depression or signs of distress with 70% accuracy. Facebook data, too, can be used for the same purpose. In isolation, each set of results shows promise, but in concert, if there were a system established that could take into account indicators from all social platforms in this way, there could be a an extremely powerful tool in the making which could detect mentally ill individuals and connect them to relevant support services ahead of time.

The other option, of course, is to demonize social media and call for a ban, particularly among younger users. And there's some merit to that, but the reality is that social platforms are here to stay. Even if you were to remove one, another would take its place. And while social media can amplify the pressure on young users to present a perfect image of their life, there are also significant benefits to social connection. Isolated and disillusioned people can find communities of like-minded folk online, the ways and means in which social can concurrently be used for mental benefit also need to be taken into consideration and measured on balance with the potential negatives.

Through research like this, the hope is that we can ramp up the beneficial uses of such data to ensure more people get help when they need it, rather than being brought down further by online communication. It's a difficult issue, and as has been well-documented, one that Twitter, in particular, has long struggled to tackle. But through collaborative research and enhanced data systems, we're hopefully on track to being able to help more than hurt through our wider social interactions.

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Original source: What Your Instagram Posts Reveal about Your Mental State (and Why That's Important).
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5 Unique Ways Brands are Using Instagram Stories

Instagram launched their newest feature, Stories, earlier this month as a way to continue to compete with Snapchat. The premise is basically the same as Snapchat Stories in that users can take (or upload) pictures or videos and add them into their story, where they last for 24 hours – Instagram CEO, Kevin Systrom, has even given Snapchat credit for innovating the way users consume and share content in this format.

Here, we'll take a look at how a few brands are using this new feature. 

MVMT Watches utilized Instagram Stories as a way to introduce their new line of sunglasses. This product reveal is a great way to build excitement around a new product and reward your followers with inside information.

The MLB never truly runs out of content with the so many games played every day and night. They currently use Instagram Stories as a fun way to showcase highlights or memorable moments from the previous day of games in the form of a social newspaper. This approach differentiates it from their normal content and keeps it fresh for their followers.

Whole Foods is using Stories to share lifestyle shots of their favorite items on sale each week. This is a great way for social media to influence in-store purchase intent. It would be interesting to see a "social-only discount" for those that screenshot the story and display it at the registers.

Travel Channel is giving their followers a first-hand look at places around the world by allowing their influencers to post stories on their channel. This exclusive content is a great way to make your audience feel a part of an experience while also allowing your influencers to add their own unique voice.

In a humorous twist, Food Network is using Instagram Stories to alert their followers about upcoming content that can be viewed on their Snapchat Discover channel. Cross-promoting content is a great way to build anticipation and drive viewership on a platform they might not be following yet.

All in all, Instagram Stories provides another unique platform for serving content to your followers. Instagram's differentiator is that it has already created more of a community feel for brands, whereas Snapchat is still more of a user-to-user platform.

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Original source: 5 Unique Ways Brands are Using Instagram Stories.
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LinkedIn Now Supports Hashtags Again – Sort of

Everyone knows that LinkedIn doesn't support hashtags, right? That, of course, doesn't stop people from using them on the platform all the time, much to the amusement of smug social media types (myself included) who scoff at such folly – "hashtags don't work on LinkedIn, fool".

As it turns out, the "fools" may actually be onto something, as LinkedIn has announced that it now supports hashtags. Sort of.

In a new post on the LinkedIn blog, LinkedIn has outlined ways in which they've improved the search functionality of their mobile app.

For example, LinkedIn have updated their search functionality to enable users to find articles which they've seen in their feeds:

"Enter the keywords you remember in the search box and find what you're looking for under the Posts tab of the search results page."

They've also updated their overall content search capacity, with improved options to help you find relevant on-platform material related to any topic.

And they've also added new hashtag search capacity:

"Hashtags included in your posts (or others) are now tappable and lead to search results so that you can discover other posts with the same hashtag. Simply add a hashtag to your post and it will be automatically available publicly. As you would expect, you can also search for a hashtag to see all public posts tagged with it."

So, now you can use hashtags on LinkedIn, and they're actually searchable. Mostly.

In what seems like an odd move, hashtag functionality has only been added to the app. For example, in the app, I can see this post with an active, clickable hashtag – I tap on it and it takes me to the relevant search results for that tag (image 2).

But on desktop, that hashtag is not clickable. Not in the slightest.

So while LinkedIn has added hashtag functionality, it's not universal across all devices, which seems like an oversight – why not make them active everywhere?

In other words, some non-app users may still see LinkedIn hashtag users as fools, however it may be they who are the fools, especially considering the majority of LinkedIn traffic is now mobile-originated.

Worth noting, too, that LinkedIn did once support hashtags previously, back in 2013, but they rolled it back due to poor user response. This may be why there's still a level of confusion as to whether hashtags are applicable on the platform or not.

In summary, none of us are actual fools in this scenario. Or we all are, I don't know – but LinkedIn kind of supports hashtags again, either way. 

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Original source: LinkedIn Now Supports Hashtags Again – Sort of.
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All The Social Ladies Podcast: Marifer Rodriguez

How do you take a century-old company that's all about mail and turn it into a technology company that's all about the engine behind making businesses work? Today, I talk to Marifer Rodriguez all about how she leads social media marketing at Pitney Bowes. You'll hear how Pitney is at the forefront of changing perception of their brand. It's really awesome – take a listen.

How To Rally Executives Behind Social

Achieving Goals on Social Media

Balancing Personal and Professional Life on Social Media?

How did you impact change in social media at Pitney Bowes?

"Pitney Bowes had been going through a transformation. There's been a lot of change over the past four years. With the arrival of a new CMO, a marketing group was formed in social media and all of our marketing efforts in general became much stronger than they had been in the past. One of my many roles was to work with executives one-on-one to help them see the value of social, teach them how to become more active on social and how to build relationships online beyond Twitter and sharing pictures. In 2015 we also went through a whole re-branding process and worked with a number of executives to tell their senior leadership stories externally on Twitter. This also helped to get executive buy-in at a high level. Once we started with executives on their stories, they really got involved and worked hard to build their social presence along with writing content and blogs to support their Twitter Chats. It was these live conversations and experiencing for themselves that led our executives to have their 'aha' moments about social media."

Why is Pitney Bowes on social media today, and what are you trying to achieve?

"We're on social to raise awareness about our different capabilities?. We're going through a period of transition, so one of our main goals is perception and how people view us as – not only a mail company, but also a technology and global e-commerce company. We want to convey this message in all of our posts and interactions on social media. We also want to continue to build relationships with our community and our customers. You have to be where your customers are and if they are on social, you really have to engage with them."

-"One of my many roles was to work with executives one-on-one to help them see the value of social, teach them how to become more active on social and how to build relationships online beyond Twitter and sharing pictures!"

-"You have to be where your customers are, and if they're on social, you really have to engage with them."

-"We set up Twitter Chats with our senior leadership team to share their behind-the-scenes. It was these live conversations and experiencing it for themselves that led our executives to have their 'aha' moments about social media."

Enjoy, and check back here for more episodes of the All the Social Ladies podcast on Social Media Today.

This article was originally published on Apple News:        

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Original source: All The Social Ladies Podcast: Marifer Rodriguez.
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This is Why Your Website Needs to be Optimized for Mobile

I'm not going to start this post with a story about how every time I see my friends and family, we stick our noses in our smartphones and ignore one another. I'm not even going to give you the "gone are the days when mobile device users could be ignored" line.

You already know all this. You know people are glued to their phones. You know that this includes your customers. You know we search for local businesses on smartphones. Maybe you even know that 82% of smartphone users look up information on their phones while they are in a store contemplating a purchase decision. 

And you've probably been to a website on your phone only to leave frustrated because the site wasn't optimized for your device. But, did you know that despite the fact that 56% of traffic to the leading websites comes from mobile devices, only 50% of small business websites are optimized for mobile? 

Seems counter-productive, doesn't it? And only 60% of small businesses even have a website (but that's a story for another day). 

Mobile optimization is a digital marketing buzzword that means a website is designed to adapt to the device the consumer is using to search for your business.  

Well, both search engines and the people who use mobile devices to search for local businesses favor mobile-optimized websites.

Mobile Internet usage is 75% and growing. Besides, imagine it from a consumer's standpoint. If I'm on my phone searching for a place to eat near me, and I click a restaurant's website only to find the menu is tiny and the site is difficult to navigate, I'm going to move on to the next business.

I'm not the only one. In a survey, 91% of consumers indicated that they'd turn to a business's competitor if the business's website wasn't optimized for mobile devices.

Seriously, mobile optimization is important: 

And mobile optimization isn't just important for consumers. Search engines favor mobile-optimized websites too.

Of course, you want your business to rank high in searches – but did you know that search engines will penalize websites if they aren't mobile-friendly? In April 2015, Google updated its search ranking algorithm to reward mobile-friendly websites for mobile searchers. Websites that weren't mobile-friendly eventually saw a decrease in search rankings while the mobile-optimized sites tended to see an increase in rankings. 

And in May 2016, Google tweaked this algorithm again so that mobile-friendly websites got an additional boost in search rankings. And Google and Bing both tell searchers whether or not a website is mobile-friendly in search results on mobile devices.

So, if your website isn't easy for consumers to use on their smartphones, search engines will lower your mobile search rankings, making it harder for consumers to find you.

How does Google define mobile-friendly? Here's the definition from Google's Mobile Terms Glossary:

"Usable on a mobile device (e.g. the site doesn't slow down the phone, doesn't scroll horizontally in a vertical orientation, doesn't use unavailable plugins like Flash). It's designed for the form factor of the device and its display."

Mobile-optimized websites need to have font that's large enough for consumers to read as well as clickable links or buttons spaced far enough apart that users don't have trouble clicking the right button. And there is so much more that Google takes into account when determining if a website is mobile-friendly.

In fact, Google has a list of 25 mobile site design principles. 

And Bing has similar criteria for judging the mobile-friendliness of a page. Factors include:

Spacing of links and buttonsText sizeWhether or not the page fits the width of the screenDevice compatibility

Bing and Google both have mobile-friendly testing tools for websites. Just copy and paste your website's URL and click "analyze" to see how your site stacks up.

Google recently updated its mobile-friendly testing tool. You can also check out Bing's here. 

While fresh content is good for search engines, it isn't usually possible for small businesses to update their websites or create new blog posts frequently.

There are a few reasons you might want to update your website, but unless it's outdated or difficult for consumers to use, it might not be necessary.

However, if your business is undergoing a big branding change or you're moving or adding locations, it's definitely worth considering an update to your site, along with content that will reflect those changes.

And if your site still isn't mobile-friendly, that's another reason you'll want to update it. Don't lose customers (and money) to competitors just because people can't navigate your site on their smartphones.

This post was created in collaboration with David Diebolt.

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Original source: This is Why Your Website Needs to be Optimized for Mobile.
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