The Week in Social: Business Messaging, BS Detection, and Spotify Billboards

Facebook Messaging is Business

What is the developing value of using Messaging as part of consumer relationship management? Facebook commissioned a study of 12,500 people in 14 markets on how they interact with businesses using messaging apps. 63% of those surveyed said they felt being able to chat with a business makes them feel more positive about the brand. 63% also said that being able to make a payment in a messaging app matters to them. 56% would rather message a brand rather than call customer service, but we would suggest that number is elevated because messaging apps don’t have terrible hold music.

Facebook Games

While Facebook wants you to use Messenger for Business, it also want you to use it for Play. Earlier reports of hidden games have come to light, and the social channel has launched 17 playable mini-games inside of Messenger. Keen marketers will be looking to see how Facebook enables ad targeting based on average Words with Friends scores.

The ballad of Instagram & Snapchat

The competition for audience between IG & SC is fought on a week to week basis. On one side, you have the innovative young upstart with the captive audience of ad-desirable millennials. On the other, the first hugely popular photo sharing app acquired by a megalithic social entity that can efficiently copy any feature. If you’re looking for a quick guide for how they differ this week in audience and functions, look no further than this handy graphic from One Productions.

Facebook blocks/unblocks BS Detector

The public cry for social channels to call out fake news sites goes on. Facebook and Google are both reportedly working on the problem. Meanwhile, a story developed this week with a Facebook plugin called ‘BS Detector’. Initially, a false article was posted that identified the plugin as Facebook’s own work. The plugin’s real developer identified himself, and the plugin was blocked by Facebook. Later, Facebook unblocked the plugin without apology. This fake news problem is going to be tricky.

Anonymous video streaming

Do you want to spill the beans on your evil corporate overlords? Need to deliver an impassioned video editorial without it coming home to roost? Looking to anonymously deliver your manifesto for world domination? There is an app for that. Dusk is a new app that pixelates the video and disguises the voice. Users share live and recorded videos within the network which boasts end-to-end encryption. Will this be a new model in editorial? Or will it be another proof for online disinhibition, aka John Gabriel’s GIFTheory?

Spotify exposes user data

It was a bold and playful campaign. Spotify took up several out of home boards and used them to give their users a quirky, personal shout out. “To the person in NoLita who started listening to holiday music in June” along with several other signs that called out user activity. The campaign spanned the globe, and is one of our favorites for the week for using in-house data for social good.

Changing Millennial Social Habits

A predictive article from Anna Johansson presents thoughts for millennial behavior in 2017. One of the more provoking questions: will millennials continue to diversify their social presences, or will they fall into the echo chamber? As platforms continue to optimize content feeds based on the user’s activity, the less and less diverse that content is likely to be. We’ll be watching how this shift content consumption in the coming year.

Influencer Marketing

The phrase officially joined the buzz lexicon this year. We’ve spent a good amount of the year explaining the difference between good and evil in the Influencer Marketing space. Part of the good is knowing the relevance, investment and return on effort, and the evil is… extensive. A new study by Linqia reports that 86% of surveyed companies are ready to put Influencer Marketing into their strategy for 2017. 78% report that determining ROI for the program is their biggest challenge.

CNN Acquires Casey Neistat

2016 has seen the first social influencers moving into the main stream. Attempting to appeal to a younger audience, CNN has made a new move with Casey Neistat. The company has bought Neistat’s app Beme, and has tapped him to run a new wing that will focus on producing content on smart phones. Matt Hackett of Beme and formerly of Tumblr will be running the technical show at the new venture. We will wait to see if Neistat can convert his 5.9 Million YouTube video followers into a needed boost at CNN.