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In an attempt to bring conversations about real time events to the forefront of the platform, Facebook have decided to introduce hashtags to their platform. As of yesterday, hashtags have become relevant and clickable on Facebook. When users click on a hashtag it will direct to a feed of posts about to the topic that other users and pages are posting. Users can also search for hashtags, click on hashtags used by other services such as Instagram and create posts directly from the hashtag feed. Facebook have said that they intend to roll out more updates regarding hashtags, including trends and insights.

Meanwhile, you can read what we think hashtags will mean for brands here

Twitter gives users access to analytics

Access to Twitter’s various tools for analytics has quietly been rolled out to users. Everyone now has the ability to gather data about their followers and most recent tweets. Several users noticed the development earlier this week.

Users can now go to their Twitter Ads dashboard and go to ‘analytics’ to access the information. The feature builds a graph that shows users mentions, follows, and unfollows over the past month. It also lists the user’s most recent tweets, detailing the number of times it has been tweeted, replied to or favourited. You can also see the number of times someone has clicked on a link within a tweet, so it is easy to see how many referrals you’re getting from the site.

The best part is that it is incredibly easy to use so humble bloggers and marketing managers alike can use it.

Twitter retires AP1 v1

Yesterday Twitter put API v1 to bed in order to fully transition to API v1.1 – meaning that many Twitter apps will be no more – including TweetDeck for AIE, iOS and Android.

Twitter have decided to restrict the access to their API – the very thing that allowed third party developers to create tools that enhanced user experiences and helped make the platform so successful in the first place. The Twitter team wants to gain more control over the platform’s development.

The original transition was planned for May 7^th but got pushed back to ensure the move would be a problem-free as possible.

If developers still have not updated their apps then they can still do so, all the information is available on Twitter’s developers’ blog.

Foursquare introduces Time Machine

Foursquare have introduced a new way to visualize check-in history. Time Machine allows users to see every check in and gives recommendations on where to go to next. It also a quite nice looking, which is a plus because those all-important infographics always need sharing.

Twitter launches #FollowMe

Twitter has launched another new tool this week. #FollowMe gives users the opportunity to browse through new followers’ timelines in one video clip, the main aim being to see if they are worth the follow back. The tool uses Vizify, a plug-in that creates interactive infographics, to build a HTML 5-based video to show highlights from a fellow users’ tweets, followers, photos and Vine videos. It is automatically created but users can edit what highlights are actually featured.

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Advantages

Integrated Campaigns - One thing I’m looking forward to, from a selfish marketing point, is finally being able to have fully integrated campaigns and tracking it in greater depth but we’ll move on to that in the next point. Hashtags are everywhere now in marketing and we’ve seen some great integrated campaigns in the last 12 months like Dollar Shave Baby, Old Spice’s Muscle Music and Nike’s #FindGreatness campaign. Now, with the potential for campaign conversations to happen on Facebook it’s add another element to your marketing campaign. A Facebook spokesperson said  “Like other Facebook marketing tools, hashtags allow you to join and drive the conversations happening about your business…We recommend you search for and view real-time public conversations and test strategies to drive those conversations using hashtags.”

Big Data - Brands who are harvesting big data are currently reaping the rewards, whether it be it consumer trends or simply the top topics mentioned it’s now becoming the most important aspect in the social space. With the launch of hashtags on Facebook brands have been given the opportunity to see what consumers are actually talking about. Brands will now be able to see all conversations across all sectors & can tailor their posts based on these. Although you could previously do this on Twitter, transferring these learnings over to Facebook didn’t always make sense.

Take the #WWDC on Monday that took place, Apple were able to analyse all the mentions across Twitter in one place. Within seconds using specific tools they were able to see sentiment and opinions about the conference. Add extra filters with specific keywords and you’ve got consumer perceptions and opinions on every product launched. Now you can do this on Facebook. Take our client Gumtree who get nearly 50+ mentions of the hashtag #Gumtree on Twitter per day. This allows us to analyse the types of ads being shared and categorise users based upon these. Whether this will transfer over to Facebook we have yet to see but the prospect is mouth watering.

Hashtag Ads (not here yet but it’s only a matter of time) - The introduction of hashtags will no doubt pave the way for another paid method of getting your message across to potential fans. Even though Facebook have came out and said that it’s not opening the program up to advertisers, it’ll only be a matter of time! Considering they’ve actually said “If you are already using hashtags in an advertising campaign through other channels, you can amplify these campaigns by including your  hashtags in Facebook advertising” combined with the fact we know Facebook pretty much try and monetize everything…we give it 6 months before you can pay for ‘Sponsored Hashtags’.

Better 3rd party platform Integration - Probably one of the main reasons for Facebook incorporating the hashtag is for people who syndicate posts across multiple networks. Let us not forget that Facebook bought Instagram, people share their Foursquare updates to Facebook, oh and the annoying people who share their tweets to Facebook (see below)! For example, an Instagram picture with hashtags with it will have hashtags enabled on Facebook — though clicking a hashtag should still find only matching Facebook content, not Instagram content. It’ll be interesting to see if people who syndicate tweets and use #NowPlaying – will this then open the opportunity for Facebook to drive people towards the music services like Spotify.

Customer Service - Social media disasters usually come with a hashtag and the majority of the time is brand related, therefore brands will now be able to monitor conversations around these. Take #susanalbumparty for example, most likely on purpose but you were able to monitor all conversations around the launch, most be it comical. By using company-specific hashtags or even topical hashtags around common problems, brands can invite people to contact them for help. Since hashtags on Facebook will be public domain, you can now even attract prospective customers who are looking for help related to a problem.

Pitfalls 

Dual Screen - If Facebook are trying to win the battle of the dual screen, I think they’re in trouble! No one on Twitter minds if you post 30 times in an hour about a show that you love but everyone hates the person on Facebook who tells the whole world what they’re doing minute by minute…I’ve got a couple of friends who write Facebook updates during rugby games and it annoys the crap of me. Personally, if I was going to pick one platform to improve my experience on the shows that I’m watching it’s going to be Twitter. Anyone who would rather do it on Facebook, please let us know in the comments, it’ll be interesting to hear your thoughts about it! (Just remind me not to send a friend request!)

Over use of irrelevant hashtags - We’ve all seen them on Twitter, #MoviesThatNeverGetOld & #OneDirectionAreBetterThan (my personal favourite!) and there’s no doubt in my mind that they’ll find their way over to Facebook. One of my pet peeves, that people do on Twitter, is put a whole sentence or a complete thought into a hashtag…why, why do it, there’s no need! Nothing is more aggravating to me than when a Tweet appears on my feed with complete sentences as a hashtag. We’ve all got on of those Facebook friends who is more than likely to do it, so just be careful and get ready to un-friend people .

Hashtag Hijacking - Jumping into a preexisting conversation about a trending hashtag to promote your product or services is going to come across as tacky. Unless you completely understand the trending topic or can add something of value to the dialogue, stay out of it. Let’s no forget #McDStories.
Lots of people may think that Facebook are just copying their competitors but from my perspective I’m think “why not?” it’s proven to work on other platforms so why not implement it on Facebook. One thing I’m intrigued/interested to see is if Facebook emulates Google+, in terms or automatically adding a hashtag when you post about certain topics. Just remember, when these do go live (in the UK) there’s two key thing: 1. #Do #Not #Over #Do #It #On #The #Hashtags and 2.#KeepItSimple!

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Then there’s the sheer amount of social platforms you can choose from. If you want to ‘do social’ it’s a good idea to have at least a presence on as many as you can, but each platform works in different ways. A picture that will work as a tweet probably won’t be the perfect Pinterest post.

As sought-after it may be, there’s no magic formula for social media engagement, but we’ve attempted to make it slightly easier for you. We’ve collated a lot of the information out there, cut through all the jargon and here is a basic guide to what we think makes the ‘perfect post’:

Copy and paste the code below into your web page to embed this infographic.

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Influence analysers Klout have announced that next week ‘Klout for Business’ will be available. This upgrade will allow users to view their statistics across networks including Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Brands will be able to track and measure their influence across their social networks and discover their ‘moments’ with their fans and followers to find what topics they engage the most with.

Any brands currently holding a Klout account will automatically be upgraded to Klout for business – and any businesses wanting to stay as a personal account can do so by choosing ‘I am an individual influencer’ from their profile settings page.

Twitter updates Tweetdeck

Twitter started rolling out web and Chrome updates of Tweetdeck on Wednesday. They have introduced a sidebar on the left of the screen that makes it quicker to browse through feeds and search. Down this bar are a number of icons for each function. These can be expanded to full descriptions when prompted, Tweets are also created at the left instead of the traditional position at the top of the screen; this means that more space can be given to the actual streams.

As well as this, search now provides a list of suggested terms. The sidebar can also rearrange column order when dragged up or down the list and this changes what users see in the main screen.

Channel 4 set to release a ‘second screen’ app

Channel 4 has confirmed they are releasing an app that will take advantage of the ‘second screen’ phenomenon. The app is being referred to as ‘4Now’ but users will be given the chance to change this name when it goes live. The app will feature votes, quizzes and games all in real time. There will also be opportunities for brands to advertise in sync with the broadcasted breaks. It also gives audiences more information about the shows and integrates with Twitter to encourage usage in line with the way social media is already used when audiences are watching TV.

The app will be launched on iOS in beta in July and available to the broadcaster’s registered viewers, which includes 1 in 3 of all 15-24 year olds in the UK.  This will take previous ventures Channel 4 have taken in second screening, including the playalong app of Million Pound Drop, to the next level.

 Apple is planning a music streaming service

Apple is planning to take on Pandora and Spotify in the music-streaming arena, sources have told Reuters. The service has been planned for around a year, big advertisers have already been contacted and now Apple are planning to sell more advertising on their own music-streaming service. Already dubbed ‘iRadio’ by the media, the service is said to mimic Pandora in terms of audio and banner ads throughout, including mobile.

‘iRadio’ is said to launch this year and Apple is plunging in at the deep end at a time when licensing for such services has increased so much it has forced both Pandora and Spotify to put a cap on free listening, particularly on mobile.

They have also been beaten to the punch by Google, who announced their intentions to launch their own music streaming service, ‘Google Play Music All Access’, last month.

Mashable challenges community to set Vine record

The Mashable community have shown a great affection for Vine with previous challenges the team have set and so they have decided to use the video sharing app for good.

The digital news site have asked fans to create a Vine that shows awareness for the fight against AIDS across the globe to set the record for the most Vine posts created for a single cause. The team have teamed up with AIDS charity (RED) to set this record and to get involved simply post a Vine with the hashtag #REDworldrecord. The posts can be as simple or complex and professional as possible – whether it be shooting stop motion with a red theme or filming someone saying a message of support.

The attempt will begin at 9am E.T. on Wednesday June 5th.

The post This Week In Social: Klout for businesses, Tweetdeck updates, Channel 4 app, Apple music streaming, Mashable Vine record appeared first on mycleveragency - Full Service Social.

The findings have been featured on a number of news sites, including Wall Street Journal and The Telegraph.

You can view Brandwatch’s findings here.

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British based Everyday Sexism Project, US writer Soraya Chemaly and the creator of Women, Action & the Media, Jaclyn Friedman, launched a campaign just last week that has forced Facebook to reevaluate their classifications of ‘hate speech’.

The campaign wanted Facebook to have stricter regulations over their content due to the amount of pages and posts on the platform that joke about violence against women. Supporters emailed, Tweeted using the hashtag #Fbrape and supported the campaign via Facebook. More than 5,000 emails and 60,000 tweets were sent to companies whose adverts were being featured on these Facebook pages. The posts and groups in question joke about rape and domestic violence and feature images such as Rihanna with a beaten face captioned ‘Chris Brown’s greatest hits’.

Although adverts are user, not page, targeted at least 15 advertisers pulled their adverts from the social platform, including Nationwide UK and Nissan UK. Facebook released a statement on Tuesday promising to review what they class as ‘hate speech’ and train their moderation staff in conjunction with this. A lot of these images until now have been classed as ‘distasteful humour’ and not deemed offensive enough to be pulled from the site.  Facebook has been dubious with such actions due to their stance on free speech and did not want to undermine the basis that the platform is based on.

Facebook’s statement read: ‘In recent days, it has become clear that our systems to identify and remove hate speech have failed to work as effectively as we would like, particularly around issues of gender-based hate…We need to do better – and we will.’

Twitter updates iOS app

Twitter has carried out some key updates to their app. The changes are mainly visual, including the ability to preview a tweet before posting.  This update takes the app up to version 5.7.

The design has been updated to a wider timeline span throughout the entire app. When tweeting photos from the mobile app, a full preview will be given pre-tweet, instead of the previous cropped version. There will also be an easier way to share photos; an icon will be shown in the bottom of the Tweet box that will allow users to access their camera roll with one tap. In line with this, users will be able to see their avatar and username in their tweet composing, to give a better impression of how their tweet will actually look.

Twitter is also making the app simpler to use. Users with multiple accounts will now be able to select the account they want to use simply by tapping on their avatar. A notification will now also be sent out to users when a friend joins the platform, along with several bug fixes for the app. The updates will be a welcome inclusion to an app that is probably one of the most used.

Facebook introduces verified accounts

Taking a leaf out of Twitter’s book, Facebook have decided to introduce the little blue ‘tick’ system to popular, well known and celebrity accounts. The tick will be displayed next to the owner’s name in the social platform; this includes search results and anywhere else on Facebook the page may appear. The ‘ticks’ started rolling out on Wednesday.

Pinterest to revise nudity policy

Pinterest have decided to revise its policy on nudity and pins showing nudity to be pinned by users. The social platform has had numerous complaints from artists and photographers regarding their strict policy when it comes to uploading images containing nudity:

There are already a lot of posts that feature different degrees of nudity so Pinterest may just be following what their users are doing. Obviously Pinterest is very visual so it makes sense that there are many artists using it and the current policy just won’t fall in line with a lot of their work.

Pinterest told FT “Pinterest is about expressing your passions and people are passionate about art and that may include nudes. So we’re going to try to accommodate that,”

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The predictions and rumours circulating last week have turned out to be correct and now ailing Yahoo has acquired Tumblr for a hefty $1.1 million. The main reason for this new development has been confirmed to be Yahoo’s desire to reach the coveted teenage demographic. Tumblr has a huge user base, users can create and upload their own creative content, instead of the slightly more passive social sites like Facebook.

Yahoo hopes that by buying out the high-user, low-revenue platform they will ensure users will stay on Yahoo owned properties for longer. They have stated that as part of the agreement they were not allowed to make the website more corporate or irrelevant to the audience. Users have been assured that the blogging platform will stay at the New York base and ran as a separate business – which has done nothing to quell the fission of unease the Tumblr community has expressed over the past week. The merger is expected to increase Yahoo’s audience by 50%.

Twitter adds Lead Generation Cards

On Wednesday, Twitter unveiled another update to cards – a button that allows users to register their interest for offers and discounts from brands with one click.

When a tweet containing an offer is expanded the user can see a description of the offer and opt in for it, simultaneously sending their name, Twitter handle and email address to the brand in question from the users pre-loaded account information.

This will save users time and effort, instead of filling out a form everything will be sent securely for them in one click – this may make users more inclined to claim an offer if they don’t have to fill out the tedious information usually required by brands. In turn, brands could see more potential customers

Cards are being tested with Twitter’s managed brands and will look at rolling out globally soon.

Pinterest improves pins

Pinterest have introduced yet more improvements to pins, hoping to make them more useful and easy to use on different devices.

The social platform has been working with several popular websites with Pinterest boards to allow users to see more information within pins so they don’t need to click through multiple websites to gather information they need.

On pins relating to products user will now be able to see pricing, availability and where to buy it. On recipe pins cook time, ingredients and servings will be shown in the pin itself and movie pins will feature content rating, cast members and other key information.

These more informative pins can be identified by a icon below the picture. All old pins surrounding these topics will be updated, with the aim to update all pins with this feature over time. You can only see the new pins as part of the new look – just click ‘Get it now’ on the top of the home feed.

They are also including a Pin It button for mobile apps so no matter where users are, they can select and save the information they want.

Facebook video sharing

When Twitter-owned video sharing service Vine launched in January, to great success, Facebook blocked the feature from allowing users to ‘find friends’ on their site. There are now hints that the social network is testing their own video sharing service. It has been suggested that users will be able to upload between 5 and 10 second clips to Instagram, which Facebook acquired last September. There are speculations as to whether the feature will allow Instagram’s popular filter options.

Flickr updates

Yahoo recently updated another of their acquisitions this week – Flickr got a revamp. Larger images are now available, users can upload full-resolution photos and have 1TB of free storage. They have also updated the app for Android and tablets, after recently giving their iOS app an update. This is inline, once again, with Yahoo’s aim to attract a younger audience. The photos sharing service is also trying to keep up with the success of Instagram which overshadowed the platform when users started taking a lot of images on mobile.

However, the site has received some backlash after these updates earlier in the week – the site became completely unresponsive Friday morning . Many users saw the new #badpanda image or the site was simply down. This could be due to the extra high-res images flooding in – or a resurgence in users after the updates.

Twitter premieres TV advertising

Twitter has apparently honed in on audience’s more active participation when watching TV and the trend of ‘second screening’. Video advertising is now available in Tweets. 64% of users tweet when in front of the TV so the option of adding video in tweets is hoping to extend the reach of TV ad campaigns. The feature was made available in beta for promoted tweets yesterday to a select group of companies in the US with national television campaigns.

Synchronized TV and twitter targeting will create a more engaging experience for followers and allows a brand’s message to become stronger with enhanced campaigns across two platforms.

To help run this, Twitter has given advertisers a new dashboard that allows them to see when their TV adverts have been broadcast. Along with this, it will track when users tweeted about the advert in conjunction with it being aired. This will give advertisers a helping hand when deciding how to create a successful promoted tweet and how to best build on their campaigns.

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Google launched a new music streaming service on Wednesday. The service poses a threat to other providers such as Spotify.

Google Play Music All Access was unveiled at Google I/O, the company’s annual tech developer conference.

Users will be able to stream from a library on any device using the Android Operating System. Google has signed deals with Sony, Universal and Warner, to name but a few, so millions of songs will be available. As of now the service is priced at $9.99 a month, discounted to $7.99 if users in the US sign up before June 30. No announcements have been made about pricing in other countries.

Foursquare adds more menus

Foursquare has added more menus to the mobile app with the help of Locu, the same company that powers menus on Yelp.

Businesses can update their menus and they will be loaded to Foursquare in real time. More opening hours, phone numbers and addresses are also looking to be added in an effort to make the service as up to date as possible. The partnership is also looking at expanding Foursquare to include the price listings for salons and hairdressers. This means that users could start to use Foursquare to compare businesses for their needs without having to visit each website individually.

Google+ gets updated

Google + received a massive update on Wednesday, with 41 new features being added. There are obviously more updates than can be explained individually, but one of the main features is an update to the user interface. Feeds are now separated into columns that can be altered according to screen size (basically, if you have a large screen you can put more columns in what is usually white space.) Video and image media can also fill the entire column and several tools have been animated to make them more attractive to use. Posts have also been updated, Google can now automatically add hashtags to a post by reading through the content and scanning the images. This will allow users to see posts surrounding the same topic – and of course there is the option to turn this feature off.

Google hangouts have also been made more interactive, the feature has been made into a standalone version and combines text, picture and live video that can be used across Android and iOS as well as computers. The app is available from Google Play, the App Store and the Chrome Web Store.

Yahoo rumoured to be in talks with Tumblr

Rumours have started circulating, first reported by All Things D, that the ‘aging’ Yahoo is in talks with New York based Tumblr. The blogging platform claims it has 107.8 million blogs and 50.6 billion posts. These talks could be in line with the Yahoo’s need to secure that important 18 to 24-year-old age bracket to refresh their image. Tumblr has just started deals with new advertisers, featuring brand’s blogs in user’s dashboards, and is predicted to generate anything up to $100 million this year. Strategic partnership and investments could be the next step.

Baking company’s Facebook page goes viral

Amy’s Baking Company was recently featured on the American version of Gordon Ramsey’s Kitchen Nightmares. The programme didn’t show owners, Amy and Samy, in a very positive light. After the episode aired Reddit and Yelp users let their feelings be known, and they weren’t that positive to say the least. Threads were taken down after claims they had turned into a ‘witch hunt’ – so the comments started coming in on the Amy’s Baking Company’s Facebook page instead. Posts, seemingly from the company themselves, started rolling out on Tuesday, with claims that the couple that run the bakery, Amy and Samy, will ‘take a stand’ against the negative comments about their business. But the posts became increasingly hostile, swearing at the Reddit, Yelp and Facebook users and telling them to ‘bring it on’. The long stream of rants were then deleted and this post appeared:

Over 26,000 replies have been posted since Tuesday.

Since then the Facebook page has announced a ‘re-opening’, with the promise for some proceeds to go to a charity for cyber bullying…

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All the stats have even proven Pinterest to become a leading site with conversion rates, even much high than it’s counterpart Facebook. However, there’s still room for some significant changes. Below are the main features they could introduce or change:

• Introduce Featured boards
• Public brand boards
• Improve Categories
• Introduce Pinterest API
• Allow Merging Boards
• Asses the current Analytics

Read about these in more depth over on our Econsultancy post.

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