The Week in Social: Polling, Paying, and Chinning
Influencers lead polling on Instagram
Instagram launched the Polling feature, and brands couldn’t get to it fast enough. As it turns out, Influencers scored big, and scored early. Influencer network BlogLovin’ reports 66% of influencer used the new polling feature, and 87% state they’ll use it again. Not surprising, as the interaction is far more powerful than a ‘Like’, and gives users a deeper connection to the people and brands they follow.
Read more at Digiday
FB buys TBH
Following the success of Polls in Instagram, Facebook quickly snatched up polling app “TBH”. The app aims to enable generating good-natured Q&A among friends. Questions can only be entered that produce a positive impact on the answer. For instance, “who has the more amazing beard?” The acquisition lies in a financial sweet-spot, being cheaper than developing a copy app, but not so cheap as the developers don’t profit from the buy-out.
Read more at Engadget
Growing Twitch
Amazon-owned Twitch held its annual summit in California this week. Multiple announcements were made, all of which aim to enable streamers to better understand and monetize their audience. Content makers will also soon see post-stream reporting that gamifies stats that speeds them to Affiliate and Partner status.
Read more at VentureBeat
Twitter rewriting rules for harassment
Hate, abuse, harassment and violence have all had their time on Twitter. The company is taking large steps to put an end to abusive campaigns on their channel. This week, Twitter shared a safety calendar that maps how the company will programmatically reduce abusive content. Targets for improvement include expanding bans against nudity, hate speech in account names, and how rule violation reports are handled.
Read more at The Verge
Design: The Instagram CTA
There you are, scrolling through your Instagram feed, checking up on whats to eat and wheres to go. You spot a nice shot of cookies and coffee, and – WHA-POW – there’s a bright Facebook Blue “Learn More” link. This week, Instagram has replaced the default blue with generated colors that compliment the ad. Expect a subtler, less noisy experience in your feed this week.
Read more at Adweek
Send money via Messenger + PayPal
You could already send money via Facebook Messenger. However, to do so meant entering your credit card and personal information to be stored in yet another service. Enter: PayPal. Starting this week, users can send money via PayPal within Messenger. PayPal also announced the launch of a Messenger Bot that will help answer questions and assist with account issues.
Read more at VentureBeat
Your Facebook CV
Matt Navarra of The Next Web spotted a Facebook feature enabling users to post a CV on the social channel. The revelation prompted some to warn LinkedIn that Zuckerberg is coming for them. Meanwhile, a healthy dose of others asked the rightful question: Do you really want a job application to include your full unfiltered Facebook feed?
Read more at Business Insider
#Chinning > #Winning
If you’re not following Michelle Liu, you should be. In a world of high-angle selfies, the 21-year-old Travel Instagrammer forcefully shatters the mold with her low-angle style and an irrefutable joy. The trademark look, with her trademark chin, is a refreshing disruption to travel-gramming.
Read more at The Independent