Barely a week goes by without something major happening in social media, and it’s hard to keep track of the latest news, developments and gossip on various networks. We thought it’d be great to round-up some of the more notable events on social media from the past few months on an ongoing basis, all in one place.
Snapchat’s New Ad Manager
So, any regular Snapchat user may have been flicking through their stories or articles and had an advert pop up. They blend in and look like a normal Snapchat story. However, you can swipe up to find out more about the advertisement or easily skip it by tapping. This feature has been around for a while this year, but recently, Snapchat has opened an ad manager to companies advertising on the platform.
It looks similar to the Facebook Power Editor and offers many features such as:
- Bulk Campaign & Ad Set Creation
- Audience Library
- Media Library
- Automatic Ad Permutation Testing
- Better Reporting
Companies can target age groups, gender, location and categorize their ads. Snapchat offers 4 different type of adverts, so a company can choose depending on what suits them best. Any advertisements on Snapchat usually say ‘Sponsored’ in the corner – keep an eye out.
This isn’t the only way brands have been advertising through Snapchat though. For a long time, there has been limited time Filters, which companies could use to promote a product or just their brand. The Snapchat Ad manager will just make it easier for these companies to target specific people, rather than a one advert fits all approach.
Facebook’s 24/7 Customer Service
Lots of bigger companies have recently been investing in auto-response customer service, where Chatbots will reply intelligently to customers’ enquiries. Companies create a list of questions and then create answers to those questions, a lot like FAQs. The bot will then reply to the specific question when prompted. The company would naturally anticipate a customer asking a question that the bot can’t answer, so they will come up with a way for them to contact someone works for the company who can help them with their question.
These bots can be massively helpful when a company’s office isn’t open 24/7 and customers need an immediate response – which, let’s face it, is what we all expect these days. It also means the only questions going to people in the office are things that are ones which are too complex or specific for a bot to answer.
Another benefit of the bots is that because the companies control what they say, they can alter the tone of voice to something personal and relevant to them.
The bots don’t just have to be for customer service purposes either. They can be used to actually order something from the company or use their services. They will use a phrase that triggers the bot to ask for more information or offer them a call to action.
With growing companies, these bots can be helpful as it provides good customer service and gives them an instant response.
Audi’s Virtual Reality Showrooms
With Virtual Reality on the rise and becoming popular, more companies are testing the waters in the new technology.
Audi has had a history of using technology to help reinvigorate the sales experience, and are now going to roll it out across showrooms. It’s important to them as they wanted customers to see all that they had on offer, and because only so many cars fit in a showroom, they dedicated their efforts into something where the customer could still interact, even when the car isn’t there.
Customers can view the cars in different environments, colours and see specific parts details on the vehicle. This helps the customer understand all their options, whether it’s just picking what colour they prefer, or looking at every detail of the car within the system. Soon it’s going to make it into showrooms too.
Audi was the first automaker to really dive into VR in this particular manner. Their aims are to help customers make their purchasing decision and overall, make more sales – which is happening in a really unique and personalised way.
LinkedIn Add Video Uploading Feature
LinkedIn has recently added a feature allowing people to upload videos onto their pages. This makes LinkedIn more interesting, as a range of content is available on the platform may intrigue more people, and therefore increase users on the growing platform.
Although it could increase user numbers, they have not yet given this feature to business account users. This may be due to the platform wanting the business accounts to use their paid advertising tools. However, the Senior Product Manager at LinkedIn hasn’t ruled out allowing the feature is open to businesses.
People wanting to use LinkedIn’s video feature can record through their mobile app or upload existing videos from their camera roll.
360 Video
And finally, more and more people are using 360 videos to show their experiences – it’s becoming a big deal! What could be better than finishing on watching National Geographic’s encounter with Great Hammerhead Sharks. (Okay, so it’s not completely new. But we do like sharks, and this does show just how powerful this technology can be.)