The week in social: Facebook subscriptions, Pinterest following, and Twitter partners
Facebook overhauls its privacy tools
Facebook has made a move to help users get more control over the data that is shared about them, in addition to making that data easier to find and control, with an overhaul of its security settings. To start, the setting menu for Facebook mobile apps has been reconfigured in order to make privacy settings easier to find. In addition, there are now more security shortcut settings, to help users get to the specific settings that are most relevant. Finally, there is a menu and tools for all the data a user uploads to the service, which will also allow for a secure download, transfer, or deletion of that data.
Read more on Facebook Newsroom.
Facebook is building a subscription service for creator content
In an effort to compete with services such as YouTube Red and Patreon, Facebook is testing a new subscription-based features that allows users closer exclusive access to specific creator content, and the creators more access to their fans. It’s creator-focused app which is already available on iOS will be coming to Android, and now there is a closed beta version of the service that has Facebook working with selected creators to improve its services and features. This is all followed by a monetization service that as mentioned above gets users exclusive content access and fan badges of their favorite creators.
Read more on TechCrunch.
LinkedIn now offers video for advertising and company pages
Although it has been available for individual use for some time, LinkedIn has just earlier this week made video available for posting through sponsored advertisements and company pages. Video for the advertisements will live in the feed and can be considered a form of native advertising, as opposed to be featured on the right rail or another non-feed-based location on the user’s screen. Like video news feed ads on other platforms, the marketer can decide what copy and call to action tappable button to place within the ad.
More information on LinkedIn Business.
Facebook pushes local information on the news feed globally
While it was big news in the United States and certain other regions when Facebook announced that it was going to place priority on local news for the news feed, the company this week announced that this priority was going to roll out worldwide, in all languages. Facebook will intelligently help publishers reach the right local audiences, including publishers that cover multiple cities, towns, etc.
More information on Facebook Newsroom.
Pinterest introduces a following tab
A new section of the app that is focused solely on seeing what a user’s connections are up to, the following tab lets a user see all the pins that are made by the people that are followed, in the same order that they are posted for chronological relevance. This tab is similar to the ‘following’ tab on Instagram in that it let a user see their friends’ activities. The tab will be rolling out over the next couple of weeks to all users, on Pinterest.com, and the iOS and Android platforms.
Read more on Pinterest Blog.
Twitter continues to expand its partner program
Twitter has added six new companies to its official partner program in an effort to help expand the options that advertisers have when it comes to reaching users on the Twitter platform. The new partners include Curalate, Jebbit, VidMob, Vidsy, Social Native and Animoto. In order to help identify these new partners, Twitter ran a Promote Innovation challenge in 2017, and based on the answers to that challenge, Twitter invited the aforementioned companies into the program.
More information on Twitter Blog.