Social Media updates and what they mean for you – May 12th

The breaking news this week is that Twitter is getting a new CEO. About frigging time! Oh, and some other platforms did some stuff. We’ve rounded up all the social media updates you need to know.

TikTok
Let’s start small – TikTok has added a new string to its Marketing Partners Program in the form of a Smartly.io partnership.

What does this mean for me?
This will give you a new way to facilitate in-stream shopping within the app. Basically, it’ll make it easier for you to link products to videos and then encourage users to part with their cash.

LinkedIn
LinkedIn’s carried out a much-needed purge of inactive and restricted accounts. So if you’ve seen a dip in followers, don’t panic!

What does this mean for me?
This is great news for your engagement because fewer inactive followers = better engagement. Hooray!

Facebook/Meta
Meta has made a deal with Stripe to facilitate in-app payments on WhatsApp in Singapore.

The social media giant also outlined how its multi-modal AI could work by launching ImageBind. Basically it works by taking information and learning by association to create, connect, and moderate content.

Say hello to Meta’s new AI Sandbox project, which uses generative AI to create ads.

What does this mean for me?
Unless you’re based in Singapore this deal won’t mean much! But if uptake is good we could see it being rolled out to other areas.

In all honesty, there are a lot of potential future uses, particularly around creating content.

Right now, Sandbox is in testing with a few select advertisers, so exactly how the end result will look and work is anyone’s guess. The images we’ve seen show just how useful it could be.

Twitter
Twitter’s getting a new CEO and it’s a woman! Or so we think. Can we really trust anything Musk says?

The first stage of encrypted DMs has arrived. Although they’re not actually secure yet and not everyone can use it. Ooookkkkaaayyyy…?

In yet another hilarious backtrack Twitter’s verification process is reverting to a more similar process to before. At least for government-associated profiles.

Two new DM updates have landed. First up, the ability to reply to any message within a DM thread. Similar to how it works on Messenger and WhatsApp. Secondly, you can now select any emoji to respond to a message… also similar to the messaging functionality on most other platforms.

And finally, Twitter is purging inactive accounts to free up handles.

What does this mean for me?
Hopefully (keeping bloody everything crossed) this means the incessant rollout of random initiatives with seemingly no strategy will stop. Or at the very least slow down. Assuming Musk doesn’t send the new CEO loopy that is.

Given the encryption isn’t real encryption there doesn’t seem to be much point in enabling this feature just yet. When true encryption does arrive it could be a useful tool for many businesses.

If you’re a government-affiliated organisation and want that grey tick, you can apply for it here.

Better DM functionality is a great way to engage with your audience on a personal level, which can be a fantastic way to increase overall engagement.

We have no idea. If you’ve got an active account you *should* be safe, although with the various cock-ups of late (ahem the blue tick removal) please don’t hold us to that. It could be a great time to grab that handle you’ve always wanted though!

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