How to Win With Pinterest Contests

Have you considered running a Pinterest contest?

Looking for tools to help?

Pinterest contests can increase your followers, boost engagement, and promote your brand and products.

In this article, you'll discover how to easily host and manage a winning contest on Pinterest.

Discover how to host and manage winning Pinterest contests.

Pinterest contests can be challenging to run, simply because they're hard to keep up with. Fortunately, Pinterest contest apps can make the process significantly easier. Some apps will even create landing pages to capture valuable lead information (like email addresses and phone numbers) that users otherwise wouldn't likely submit on a social media platform.

If you're going to host a Pinterest contest, here are three apps you may want to try.

Wishpond

Wishpond has a user-friendly interface and features a lot of great tools for customizing your contest to fit your needs. Wishpond's contest app allows you to create "entry galleries" where other users can vote on their favorite pins or boards that have been entered into the contest. Users can do this by submitting their email addresses, providing an additional way to capture lead information.

Other features allow you to choose customizable landing page templates, add a countdown to your landing page to increase urgency (and entries), and access analytics to see views, conversions, and conversion rates.

Wishpond's landing page templates are fully customizable and come with great features like the customized countdown to the contest's end date.

You can also share entry forms on Facebook and Twitter. The landing page is designed to be both desktop- and mobile-friendly. You can preview the landing page and entry forms while creating them.

Choose where you want to feature the landing page, and preview it for multiple formats and devices.

The Wishpond contest app features the ability to have two different periods (or sections) of the contest: one period allows entries and another only allows voting on the entries.

Being able to set entry periods and voting periods separately can extend the life of your contest and encourage more varied types of engagement.

Wishpond offers a free trial, so you can see if the software is right for you. The basic plan, which includes social promotions, starts at $45 per month.

PromoJam

PromoJam's Pin-It-to-Win-It promotions app makes it easy to run a Pinterest contest. It can take as little as 10 minutes to get your contest up and running.

PromoJam's landing page templates are stunning, easy to use, and highly customizable.

With PromoJam's Pinterest contest app, you can create an SEO-optimized URL for your landing page. Choose from a variety of stunning and fully customizable landing page templates. This landing page converts into a confirmation page once users have submitted their entry.

You can drag and drop your chosen fields to create a customized landing page.

Other PromoJam features include the ability to share customized QR codes for your contest, view analytics and user entries as the contest progresses, add social plugin buttons (like a Facebook like option) to your campaign, and use a random winner selection tool.

Asking users to repin their favorite pin from a selection doesn't break Pinterest's rules, and encourages users to share and save your content.

To use PromoJam's Pinterest contest app, you need to upgrade to the pro plan, which costs $249.99 a month, and allows you to collect up to 10,000 user submissions.

Woobox

Woobox is another amazing contest app that's used by brands like Fisher-Price, Crayola, and Shopify.

This contest entry form showcases the prize, gives valuable contest information, and encourages users to follow the company on Pinterest.

Woobox's Pinterest contest features let you collect email addresses, allow unlimited entries or only one per user, create tabs for Facebook pages, create HTML entry forms, add an age restriction, and require users to follow you to enter (users must follow you on Pinterest for contest eligibility).

On Woobox, you can award bonus entries for different actions to encourage engagement.

Woobox has a free plan and trial, so you can get a feel for the interface before you purchase. To access all of the social promotion apps continually, including the Pin to Win app, you'll need to upgrade to a paid plan. The basic plan starts at $30 per month.

Woobox's promotion tabs on Facebook allow you to promote your contest across platforms.

At a first glance, it seems like the easiest way to host a Pinterest contest would be to ask users to repin a specific pin. That would be easy to track and easy for users to participate.

However, it's not a valid option. You're not allowed to ask users to pin one specific pin. Here are some other options to consider.

Require Pinners to Use a Specific Hashtag

This can be your typical branded hashtag, but it's most effective if you have pinners use a hashtag created specifically for the contest. This is the best way to track entries, reach, and engagement of your contest.

This contest requires users to use a hashtag on pins to be considered for entry, making entries easy to track.

Whether users are adding their own content or repinning yours, use the hashtag to find it. Just as with Instagram contests, hashtags can be important for Pinterest contests.

Send Users to a Landing Page

While this isn't necessary for all contests, if you're seeking more than just repins, you'll want a landing page. A landing page allows you to collect lead information from users and spell out contest participation rules and terms. The Pinterest contest apps described above can help you create these landing pages.

Ask Pinners to Create Their Own Boards

Pinterest prides itself on creativity and using this to your advantage could mean a lot of engagement for your posts. Ask pinners to create a themed board and submit it to the contest, either with a hashtag or by sending you the link through your landing page.

Urban Outfitters asks users to create their dream room.

For example, if you run a design or home improvement store, you could ask users to create a board of DIY projects. Or if you're the publisher of a food magazine, you could ask users to create a board of their favorite holiday recipes.

Advertise a Giveaway

This is pretty straightforward, and while it may not get you a crazy amount of engagement on Pinterest, it can give you valuable lead information. Post a pin advertising a giveaway, which will send users to a landing page to collect their information in exchange for a chance to win a prize. If you're after lead information, this is an easy-to-run contest that can provide what you're looking for.

Run a "Pin to Win" Contest

While you can't ask pinners to repin a specific image, you can ask users to pin their favorite image from your website or Pinterest boards with your contest hashtag attached.

There are apps that allow you to create landing pages where you can ask users to choose from one of several pins. This gets your content distributed across the platform to new users without breaking any of Pinterest's rules. Pinners don't have to do much to enter this type of contest, so they're likely to engage with it.

YLiving's Pin to Win contest offered users the chance to win a prize if they repinned their favorite modern bedroom.

If you want to run a Pinterest contest, you first need to make sure you follow both brand guidelines and contest guidelines.

Particularly relevant brand guidelines include:

Don't use Pinterest's name or logo without their consent.Don't use off-domain redirects for third-party tracking.Don't collect or store personally identifiable information from Pinterest or its users without permission.Don't compensate or incentivize pinners to take actions like pinning or following.

Pinterest's three contest guidelines are:

Don't require participants to pin a specific image; ask them to choose a pin based on their interests, even if the pin can only come from a small selection or a specific website. You need to give them options.Don't allow more than one entry per participant; state this in your terms.Don't suggest that Pinterest is sponsoring the promotion.

You can see a full list of brand guidelines and in-depth explanations and examples of what is and isn't okay for contests here.

Conclusion

Pinterest contests are a great way to get more engagement, connect with new members of a relevant audience, and even get new lead information. While there are guidelines that you need to follow, Pinterest is a platform designed to prioritize ideas and creativity.

Taking advantage of this can help increase the success of your contests, particularly when combined with contest apps that make the process even easier.

What do you think? Have you run a contest on Pinterest? Have you tried any of these apps? Share your thoughts, knowledge, and experience in the comments below!

Tips on how to easily hold a successful contest on Pinterest.

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Original source: How to Win With Pinterest Contests.
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7 Ways to Improve Your Social Media Engagement

By Ishita Ganguly
Published May 11, 2015

Do your fans interact with you on social media?

Want to spark more engagement?

While it's relatively easy to get people to like and share posts, it takes creativity to drive comments and dialog.

Here are seven ways to get your audience to talk to you on social media.

Discover seven ways to improve your social media engagement.

Asking your fans questions may get some response. But if you really want to inspire engagement, take things up a notch.

Let's say you're in the food industry. A question like, "What's your favorite dish?" could be so basic that fans might not bother to answer. Ask a similar question with multiple-choice answers, illustrated by an interesting graphic, and you're likely to get plenty of responses.

Zomato, a restaurant finder app, writes excellent and witty social media posts. They ask questions designed to genuinely get to know their fans, and include intriguing, above-average graphics. As a result, their posts always get huge engagement.

Zomato doesn't just ask open-ended questions. They give their fans multiple-choice questions, illustrated by a creative graphic.

Post questions your audience wants to answer. Remember, pictures and a little humor do wonders for engagement.

Social media contests are very common these days, so it's important to stand out and do something different or unusual for your brand.

TurboTax is well-known tax-filing software, which may not seem interesting and appealing to people. To add some fun during tax time, this year they initiated a lighthearted Instagram contest to promote their product. People had to follow the brand on Instagram and post a picture with three zeros and a designated hashtag, #absolute0, for a chance to win $500. The contest received more than 730 official entries.

TurboTax ran an Instagram contest where they asked their audience to post and hashtag a picture with three zeros on it. Not what you'd expect from tax software, but it was unique enough to get lots of entries.

Don't just create any contest. Think outside the box and come up with something fans will want to participate in, share and discuss on your and their social sites.

Your customers more than likely have questions for you, whether they're on the company itself or your products and services. Establish a forum where they can be heard.

Host Google hangouts and Twitter chats or even create a simple Facebook post that asks your audience what they want to know about your company or product. You can interview experts related to your industry in that type of scenario as well.

For example, NASA occasionally arranges Google hangouts with astronauts and scientists, which are open to anyone interested in space exploration or work done by NASA.

NASA hosts occasional Google hangouts where people can ask questions.

No matter what your business, there are things your audience wants to know. Give them an opportunity to ask, and as a result, there will be plenty of social media engagement.

There are a couple of ways to curate content that will lead to more engagement.

First, whenever you share someone else's content, remember to tag the original publisher. This is the easiest way to attract the eyeballs of the original content creators. In the most likely scenario, they will post a comment thanking you for the share.

Another method is to write curated articles. Choose a topic and reference multiple articles, along with their authors and links. Then, tag everyone mentioned in the post when you post socially.

For example, Andrea Beltrami created a blog post with top articles on visual social media marketing. When the post went live, she shared the link and mentioned the names of all of the authors included. Andrea also gave them a shout-out on her G+ profile. The post got lots of shares and comments, many from the mentioned authors.

Andrea Beltrami curated a post of visual resource articles, and tagged everyone mentioned in the post when she shared it on social media. Many of the authors commented with their thanks.

People mentioned in a curated post are likely to comment with their thanks. The more people tagged, the more comments there will be to get the conversation going on your page.

Tagged authors are likely to share your content on their profiles and pages as well, and tag you back.

User-generated content (UGC) is an excellent way to get your fans talking on your page. It's the most convenient, yet trickiest, way to get engagement. If you don't draft the blueprint carefully, it might go unnoticed. However, you can take ideas from brands like GE, Belkin, Target, Warby Parker, Pepsi and Starbucks to get your creative juices flowing.

Starbucks' #WhiteCupContest is an excellent example of a successful UGC contest. The coffee giant took the cue from their customers, who doodled vibrant designs on the brand's iconic white cup. In 2014, they launched the first #WhiteCupContest, where customers were asked to design the cup, take a photo and share on social media using the hashtag.

Starbucks asked customers to share their white cup designs on their social pages. Image: Placeit.

The campaign received more than 4,000 entries in just three weeks. Overwhelmed by such amazing results, Starbucks launched the campaign again this year, but this time just for the store partners.

When your fans contribute to the content on your page, they're likely to engage and get their friends to join in.

Even if a social cause doesn't directly relate to your brand, you can still embrace and promote it on your page. It's always nice to do things for others. Plus, it enhances your branding.

Estée Lauder is a world-renowned beauty product manufacturer. When they conducted a Breast Cancer Awareness (BCA) campaign, it made them a socially aware and sensible brand. The call to action of the campaign was "Hear our stories. Share yours." And that's what their fans did.

Social campaigns, like the one Estée Lauder did for Breast Cancer Awareness, inspire fans to comment.

They asked their audience to visit BCAcampaign.com to hear from breast cancer survivors and share their own stories. When they initiated the program, hundreds of people shared their stories on the platform.

If there's a cause your company supports, create a campaign or just spread the word on your social pages. Fans are likely to engage with socially responsible content.

Being topical always brings fresh traffic to your page, whether it's centered on a holiday, event or live show.

For example, Papa John's Pizza posted about the March Madness basketball finals on their Facebook page. They asked fans to pick the winning team, and received more than 50 comments within a few hours.

Papa John's Pizza's posted about the March Madness finals to spark a lot of engagement in a short period of time.

When you create content that relates to current events that people are already talking about, it really helps to engage your fans.

Over to You

There's lots you can do to inspire conversation on your social media pages. You just need to get creative and come up with unique posts that will engage your fans and get them talking.

What do you think? How do you engage your social media audience? What inspires your fans to talk on your page? Please share your experience and recommendations in the comment section below.

Tips for improving your social media engagement.

(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&appId=167506593384213&version=v2.0"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));About the Author, Ishita Ganguly

Digital marketing strategist by profession. Currently experimenting with social media and mobile content marketing at TechShu. Analytics is fun for her as she gets insights to serve her readers better. Other posts by Ishita Ganguly »

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Original source: 7 Ways to Improve Your Social Media Engagement.
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How to Create Social Media Images That Connect With Your Audience

By Anna Guerrero
Published May 12, 2015

Are you sharing visual content on social media?

Do your images stand out?

Creating and curating clever visual content can engage your audience on a personal level.

The more consumers relate to you and your company, the more likely they will invest in your social media presence and your brand.

In this article you'll discover seven ways to connect with your audience using social media images.

Discover how to create social media images that connect with your audience.

Screenshots are a powerful way to share insights and information about your company, since they make your audience feel as if they're right there with you. Use screenshots to create unique, engaging content that will intrigue your fans.

In this Twitter post Buffer treats fans to the inner workings of one of its growth experiments by showing two screenshots of an A/B tested email.

Give fans insights into your company with screenshots.

The screenshots act as evidence and a visual representation of the experiment, which gives meaning to the collected data. The text that accompanies the post is short, yet effective. It provides a hook for the article, but lets the screenshots speak mostly for themselves.

The brain is capable of processing visual content 60,000 times more quickly than text, which is why images help you stand out on social media. Infographics take this concept to the next level, as they allow you to convey large chunks of interesting information in a visually captivating way.

For example, Compassion International created a compelling infographic for World Poverty Day. When people share the graphic, they also share numerous facts, as well as a whole lot of awareness about an important cause.

Use infographics to compile facts and figures visually into one powerful message. Image: Placeit.

Infographics allow you to create an impact and capture the attention of your followers with just one image.

Your followers see your logo on their social media feed and your products in real life, but there's so much they don't know about their favorite brands. How exactly how does Hershey's make their chocolate kisses? Who voices the Geico gecko? What is your brand's unknown?

Give your audience a glimpse of who you really are with behind-the-scenes pictures from your company.

Nasty Gal clothing CEO Sophia Amoruso regularly appears on the company's social media pages to show that they are not "just another fashion retailer." By connecting with her fans on a personal level, Amoruso humanizes the Nasty Gal brand. She encourages audiences to connect as a friend, rather than a business, which boosts engagement tenfold.

Engage your fans on a personal level by showing them you're just like them.

Use images to put a face to your name. This helps people better visualize your brand, so you can create a strong and lasting rapport with your audience.

Images that feature your product in action can ignite a spark of imagination from your followers and encourage them to engage with your content.

This dynamic and exciting image from Gatorade's Twitter page shows the brand's main product in motion.

This image of Gatorade being spilled from its bottle leads followers to imagine it in real time. It gives the impression of a video.

Consumers' minds instantly process the series of events that led up to this moment (the action and energy that caused the bottle to spill), as well as the events that follow (the splatter of blue liquid; the color, smell and taste).

Without realizing it, we become engaged with the product and brand by filling in the blanks. Take and share photos that inspire the same reaction.

Quote graphics encourage your audience to stop, reflect and engage with your content. These are some of the most shared images on social media, since they relate to wide ranges of audiences.

Create visually appealing quote graphics with an edge of style that suits your brand. They can be used for just about any purpose: to inspire, advocate, entertain, intrigue, etc.

In this quote from L'Oreal Paris USA's Twitter they've chosen a font that matches the tone of their message: handwritten text for a very personal quote. Carefully style your quote, so your audience wants to become part of the conversation and share what the words mean to them.

Choose fonts, colors and images that relate to the message of your quote.

Remember, always post with purpose. Think about what each particular quote says about your brand and decide if that message is relatable to your target audience. If you're happy with the quote, then turn it into a stylish graphic that brings the words to life.

Want to get lost in the crowd? Jump on the bandwagon and post visual content that is almost identical to other brands and accounts. This is a huge mistake many social media accounts make.

Some images are popular or funny for a reason, but chances are your audience has already seen this content a multitude of times before viewing your take on it. Provide original visual content that's tailored to your audience instead of replicating what was popular elsewhere.

Create unique images. Share photos that highlight your brand personality or the people behind it or design your own graphics from templates to look professional while generating massive appeal.

Come up with a unique idea for an image that reflects your brand and run with it!

Find your tone and share images that fit with your brand. Remember: anybody can replicate content that is already popular. Stand out by creating original and adventurous visuals!

There are plenty of design tricks you can use to improve your graphics, so your fans stop their mindless scrolling and engage with your posts.

Use emotive color palettes to enhance your images. Experiment with unique photo filters, palettes and color schemes.

What feelings, emotions and sentiments do you want to evoke from your social media audience? Do you want something fun and summery? Try some reds, oranges and warm browns. Are you looking for something calming and soft? Try faded colors, pastels and pale hues. Inspire a feeling with a carefully chosen palette.

After you find images you like, use a color picker tool to extract different hues and create a mood.

Just as colors conjure up certain emotions, so can certain fonts. You probably wouldn't use an elegant script typeface to advertise a rock and roll concert, would you? Consider your context, tone and audience and pick a font to suit.

Choose fonts that reflect the style and tone you're trying to convey.

When toying around with font pairing, keep a few things in mind: Use high contrast between type and background. Also, choose typefaces that are easy to read and complement each other.

Over to You

Everyone wants their company's images to stand out on social media. To use visuals to increase engagement, create graphics for your social networks that speak to your audience.

Research design techniques and visual content apps, as well as what works for other brands, so you can experiment and figure out what images best resonate with your audience. Above all else, remember to be original!

Entice your fans visually, answer their questions and pique their curiosity.

What do you think? What do you do to connect with your audience using visual images? How do you make your images stand out? What are your favorite examples of good graphics? Please share your thoughts in the comments.

(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&appId=167506593384213&version=v2.0"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));About the Author, Anna Guerrero

Anna Guerrero heads up editorial and content marketing at Canva. Canva is launching new features to enable small businesses, bloggers and their teams to create more stunning graphics and boost their traffic. Other posts by Anna Guerrero »

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Original source: How to Create Social Media Images That Connect With Your Audience.
http://www.jretechnology.com

Facebook Live Rolls Out Continuous Streaming: 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 Enables Continuous Live Video Support and Geogating: "Facebook will now allow non-stop, long-form broadcasting." TechCrunch reports that the only tradeoff for the Continuous Live Video API is that "unlike [the] normal Facebook Live stream, there's no option to let people replay the stream later or rewind to earlier." Facebook also rolled out a new geogating feature to the Live API, which allows publishers to "make a video visible only to people in a particular location if that's where it's most relevant or they only have limited broadcast rights."

Explore.org uses Facebook's Continuous Live Video API to power its nature cams.

Twitter Adjusts 140-character Limit: "In the coming months, [Twitter will] make changes to simplify Tweets including what counts toward your 140 characters, so for instance, @names in replies and media attachments (like photos, GIFs, videos, and polls) will no longer 'use up' valuable characters." This update will be available over the coming months.

In the coming months, we're introducing new ways for you to express even more with a Tweet: https://t.co/l1sWRvXWqr pic.twitter.com/zzhWpRcABs

— Twitter (@twitter) May 24, 2016

Instagram Adds Media Buying Specialty to the Instagram Partner Program: The Instagram Partner Program helps businesses in three key areas: ad tech, community management, and content marketing, and announced that it will be adding a new specialty: media buying. According to the Instagram for Business blog, the new media buying specialty partners, SocialCode and Resolution Media, "can help [marketers] with Instagram advertising operations" and "are dedicated to helping businesses – large and small – with market-leading media buying services to reach specific marketing objectives." Instagram confirms that the new media buying specialty is currently only available in the U.S., but "will expand to new countries in the future."

Instagram announced "a new specialty for the Instagram Partner Program – Media Buying."

Facebook Introduces Engagement Graphs for Facebook Live Replays: Facebook put "reactions to work" by using them "to power a visualized timeline of when a Live video receives the most engagement." Users can simply "fast-forward through the recorded replay of a Live clip… [and] see the graph of reaction volume overlaid on the progress bar." With this new feature, you can essentially "see when the video gets interesting and skip there if you want."

Periscope Rolls Out Permanent Save Feature: As promised in an earlier announcement on the Periscope company blog, the live broadcasting app has officially rolled out the ability save broadcasts and "keep them beyond 24 hours." When this feature was initially introduced as a public beta, users had to add #save to their broadcast to trigger this functionality. However, in a recent announcement, Periscope confirmed that it will now save broadcasts by default, "no #save needed."

It's here! Update your Periscope app to permanently save your broadcasts by default (no #save needed). pic.twitter.com/Tv8O48jImQ

— Periscope (@periscopeco) May 25, 2016

Facebook Retires Desktop-based Ad Retargeting Exchange: "Facebook is shutting down Facebook Exchange and moving advertisers to newer products in a coordinated effort to focus more heavily on the social network's mobile-first advertising products." With consumer usage primarily moving to mobile, "desktop has become a smaller and smaller part of [Facebook's] business" and the company will focus on newer products with "mobile retargeting features." AdWeek reports that "the company has already begun moving clients and ad tech partners over to newer products with the goal of being fully migrated by November 1, 2016."

"Facebook Exchange will no longer be available to advertisers on November 1, 2016."

In this blab from Friday, May 27, 2016, Michael Stelzner and guests discuss the top news in social media. Topics include Twitter expanding its 140-character limit (1:38), updates to Facebook Live (17:32), and LinkedIn's new advertising tools (32:28). Subscribe to future shows here.

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Instagram Shuts Down Feed API: Instagram is shutting down its feed API on June 1 as part of a bigger shift "to create more services on its own app as it strengthens its platform as a business, and also looks to create an audience of its own that is not just passing through or using its photos elsewhere." TechCrunch reports that "feed API usage is relatively small," but there are some notable services being affected by this update, including Flipboard, IFTTT, and Being.

Twitter Halts Development of Buy Button and Product Pages: "Twitter has curtailed product development on its 'Buy' button and product pages" and has "shifted its commerce team into other divisions within the company." A source from Twitter suggests that the reason for this decision is that "people are not buying on social media right now." As a result, the company has decided to increase its focus and investment on dynamic product ads instead "after seeing the great early results."

Snapchat Adds Non-Emoji Stickers to Snaps: "Snapchat now lets you attach stickers to your photos and videos." In addition to Unicode emojis, Snapchat stickers include illustrated images, which can be used to customize snaps with a click on the "Post-It-looking button on the top right" of the screen.

Twitter Audio Cards Now Support Spotify: Twitter announced that "tweets with @Spotify tracks now play in your timeline." Twitter Audio Cards for Spotify let users discover and listen to 30-second music previews within Twitter. Spotify tracks can also be featured within Twitter Moments.

You'll want the volume up for this #SummertimeSoundtrack. Tweets with @Spotify tracks now play in your timeline! ??https://t.co/93avzwiQbs

— Twitter (@twitter) May 26, 2016

Slack Hits 3 Million Daily Active Users: Slack announced on the Slack HQ blog that it now boasts "3 million daily active users." Of those, 2 million are "connected simultaneously."

"A little update about a lot of people using Slack."

Facebook Acquires Immersive Audio Company and Makes Technology Available to All Users: In a company announcement, Two Big Ears revealed that it has been purchased by Facebook and its "pipeline for cinematic VR and 360 video including the authoring tools, encoder and rendering engine" will be available to developers as part of the new Facebook 360 Spatial Workstation, which is free to download from the Facebook 360 site.

Two Big Ears' pipeline for cinematic VR and 360 video, including the authoring tools, encoder, and rendering engine are available for free via the new Facebook 360 Spatial Workstation.

Reddit Launches Native Image and GIF Uploading Tool: Reddit will "begin rolling out in-house image hosting on Reddit.com to select communities." The initial beta version of this new tool "will support single image and GIF uploads" and only be available "to 16 default communities across Reddit, followed by 50 more next week."

Snapchat Plans Discover Tab Redesign: VentureBeat reports that "Snapchat is redesigning its Discover page." The new look is expected to debut on June 7 and "is already being shared with companies who have partnered with Snapchat to appear on the section of the app." A source indicated that the new Discover tab "will feature a new layout that eschews the page's circular icons for a tiled feed more akin to Instagram."

YouTube Adds Event Pages to YouTube Gaming: YouTube announced the launch of event pages in YouTube Gaming, "which [will] serve as destinations for watching the biggest gaming and eSports events." YouTube plans to roll out this new feature with "a unique event hub for E3, available at gaming.youtube.com/e3 in June." YouTube Gaming E3 hub will house "live streams and on-demand videos" and offer users an opportunity to "chat live with fellow gamers, vote for [their] favorite trailers in the legendary Trailer Battle and catch up on announcements [they] might have missed."

YouTube launched "event pages in YouTube Gaming, which serve as destinations for watching the biggest gaming and eSports events."

Foursquare Unveils Marsbot: Foursquare introduced Marsbot, a new product that "tells you where to eat or drink before you think to ask for it" and delivers "contextually aware, proactive recommendations for awesome food and nightlife spots via the simplest communications channel possible: text." Foursquare is testing Marsbot with a limited number of iPhone users in New York and San Francisco.

Foursquare Marsbot delivers "contextually aware, proactive recommendations for awesome food and nightlife spots via the simplest communications channel possible: text."

News Use Across Social Media Platforms 2016: According to a new study from the Pew Research Center, a majority (62%) of U.S. adults get their news from social media and 18% claim to do so often. This is an increase from 2012 when only 49% of U.S. adults reported getting their news from social media. This study was based on a survey conducted in early 2016 with 4,654 members of Pew Research Center's American Trends Panel and explores which social media sites are the largest new sources, how many users access multiple sites to gather news, and how often users access these networks to intentionally gather news versus merely "happening upon it" while scrolling for other things.  For example, two-thirds (66%) of those surveyed go to Facebook to get news, while 70% turn to Reddit and 59% access Twitter. However, Facebook boasts the highest reach (67%) and is most commonly the only news source accessed (64%) compared to all of the sites measured.

Research Shows Micro-Influencers Have More Impact Than Average Consumers: Experticity released a nationwide influencer marketing study in collaboration with Keller Fay Group and the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. The researchers surveyed both "micro-influencers" and average consumers in the U.S. on the impact of word-of-mouth recommendations on purchasing decisions. According to the findings, more people are willing to follow an influencer's recommendation (82%) than an average customer's recommendation (73%). The study also discovered that influencers give more frequent and direct product recommendations than the average customer.

2Q 2016 Sprout Social Index: Sprout Social surveyed over a thousand Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram users on their expectations when reaching out to brands on social media and compared these findings with data from thousands of brand profiles across 15 industries. The study suggests that most businesses continue to use social media purely as a promotional outlet instead of a two-way communication tool with their customers. The report reveals that brands send 23 promotional messages for every 1 consumer response and 89% of social media messages from customers are ignored, an increase of 18% over the past year. Meanwhile, 90% of people surveyed have used social media to communicate directly with a brand and typically wait for an average of 10 hours for a response, if they receive any at all.

The Gig Economy Is Seeing Double: Recent research from LinkedIn ProFinder offers a list of the "most in demand" freelance professions and the top "freelance hot spots" in the U.S. The report also shares that the number of freelancers using LinkedIn to make connections has grown by 43% over the past 5 years and marketing is the number-one skill in demand on the new service.

Social Media Benchmarking Study 2015: Quintly published a social benchmark study based on data compiled throughout 2015. Analyzing over 180,000 profiles on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, this study explores profile growth and saturation, the frequency of posts and typical interaction rates on each platform, and provides insights for marketers looking to ramp up or expand their social media efforts.

What do you think of Facebook's Live Geogating? How will Twitter's new character count affect you? Please share your comments below.

Facebook Live Rolls Out Continuous Streaming and other social media news for May 28, 2016.

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Original source: Facebook Live Rolls Out Continuous Streaming: This Week in Social Media.
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