Tag: Facebook

Facebook To Expand The Reach Of Its Content With New API And SDKs

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
On Monday, Facebook introduced a new video embedding API and SDKs for Apple Watch and Apple TV, aiming to push content that currently lives on its platform into new places. The video embedding API will allow for third-party apps to use Facebook’s video player, which comes with an interactive drop-down sidebar and an autoplay option, further expanding the reach of Facebook videos. The two new SDKs, on the other hand, aim to help developers better incorporate Facebook services into the apps they are building for the new Apple TV and Apple Watch.

What Brands Need To Do
Facebook videos have been gaining momentum with brand advertisers in recent years, as Facebook’s vast amount of user data makes it as a more targeted and effective alternative to YouTube. With these new API and SDKs, brands should consider using them to expand the branded content that already lives on Facebook’s platform to reach more users across devices.

Source: The Next Web

Facebook To Take On Yelp With Local Listings

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Facebook is quietly testing a new feature that would make Yelp anxious. The social network has started to test out a new feature named “Facebook Professional Services” on its desktop site that will help users discover the best-rated and reviewed local service providers in their area.

What Brands Need To Do
As Facebook continues to make its platform more brand-friendly, brands should learn to use these new customer service tools and reach out to consumers on Facebook. Also, given that the local search results in a number of categories are pulled in from local businesses’ Pages, it is important that businesses and brands make sure their Page information is correct and up-to-date.

Source: The Verge

Facebook To Allow More Ads In Instant Articles

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
On Wednesday Facebook announced that it will soon allow publishers to include more ads in the articles published with Instant Articles. The announcement came a month after some well-known publishers challenged Facebook over the ad restrictions it imposed in Instant Articles, which limited the revenue generated from content they posted. The social network first introduced Instant Articles in May, and now sees more than 100 publishers publishing stories with this feature on a daily basis.

Market Impact
Facebook bending to publishers and loosening its restriction in Instant Articles illustrated the ongoing push-and-pull between content creators and platforms. For brands, increased ad spots in Instant Articles spell more opportunities to reach mobile Facebook users by offering them a quick access.

Source: AdWeek

Facebook Adds New Customer Service Tools To Pages

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
In its ongoing quest to boost social commerce on its platform, Facebook has unveiled some new customer-service tools for Pages to help businesses better communicate and connect with their customers. Page-owners can now set away messages, annotate private messages, and get public badges to certify how quick they usually respond to a customer’s inquiry. According to Facebook, there are currently 50 million Pages run by businesses, and 2.5 billion comments are posted on those Pages every month.

What Brands Need To Do
These new tools reinforce Facebook’s determination in making Pages and its messaging feature more brand friendly, giving brands more incentives to use Pages as a social touch-point. Brands with an established Facebook presence should learn to adopt these new communications tools to offer better customer service.

Source: AdWeek

Facebook Rolling Out Live-Streaming For Everyone

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
After testing its live-streaming feature within celebrity Pages for about 4 months, Facebook finally started rolling out its answer to Meerkat and Periscope to all users last Thursday. Named Live Video, the new feature is now available to a small number of iOS users in the United States, with plans to expand to Android and more users soon. Users will be given the option to save a recording of their broadcasts on their timelines when it’s over.

What Brands Need To Do
Facebook’s vast user base could give this new livestreaming feature a leg up and capture a large number of Facebook users who haven’t been previously exposed to live-streaming. It will provide brands with a new channel to connect with fans in real time, as well as opportunities for sponsoring social influencers or broadcasting branded events, such as what Guess recently did with AOL’s little-known live-streaming app Kanvas. Its capability to automatically save a live broadcast to a timeline should also help brands easily create some lasting video content from their live-streaming efforts.

 

Source: Digiday

Facebook And Instagram Wrap Up Holiday Shoppers For Advertisers

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
As Black Friday draws near, Facebook and Instagram are ramping up their ad products for the upcoming holiday shopping season. In fact, the two social networks will offer advertisers and brands the option to target holiday shoppers, based on their posts and interactions with others containing holiday-related keywords. The new segment is available within Facebook self-service ad dashboards in the “Behaviors” section under the “Seasonal and Events” category. Macy’s is one of the brands that are already utilizing this new targeting option, running a holiday campaign using Instagram’s new multi-video ad format called Marquee.

What Brands Need To Do
Even though Black Friday is becoming less and less relevant due to the impact of ecommerce, holiday shopping as a whoel will still count as a big portion of retailers’ annual sales. Therefore, for brands that are interested in making a big push for holiday shoppers, this new targeting tool from Facebook may prove useful.

 

Source: Marketing Land

Facebook To Make Its In-App Content Searchable By Google

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Google’s effort to keep its search engine relevant in a mobile-first world just got a boost from one of its biggest rival. On Friday, Facebook began allowing Google to crawl and index its mobile app. Google searches on Android devices will now surface information from public Facebook profiles, Pages, Groups, and Events, all embedded with deep links that will direct users to the content within Facebook’s app.

What Brands Need To Do
In order to make its search more useful on mobile devices, and therefore not losing a big portion of its search ad dollars to apps, Google has been working on convincing app developers to index their apps for deep linking. Meanwhile, Facebook looks to route more users to its mobile app via Google search, thus further cementing its lead in mobile attention. For brands, this means their Facebook content will become more discoverable, increasing their content reach.

 

Source: Wall Street Journal

Facebook To Loosen Restrictions On Instant Articles Ads

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Facebook might soon allow more ads into Instant Articles, a fast-access publishing tool it first introduced in May. Faced with mounting pressure from publishers over the limited ad revenues, Facebook is said to be considering loosening policies that limit the number of ads and prohibit rich media in Instant Articles. Facebook currently only allows one banner ad for every 500 words of content within Instant Articles, while also banning rich media ads within Instant Articles for the sake of faster loading time.

What Brands Need To Do
By loosening its restrictions for ads in Instant Articles, Facebook aims to make nice with the publishers in order to keep them on board with its publishing platform. This move should increase the ad spots available in Instant Articles, which spells new opportunities for brands to reach their audiences.

 

Source: Marketing Land

Facebook Adds 360-Degree Video Ads And Expands To iOS

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
In September, Facebook leveraged Oculus’ VR technology to bring 360-degree video support to its news feed in desktop web and Android app, and now it’s bringing those interactive spherical videos to iOS. The technology allows users to change viewing perspective by tilting their iPhones and turning around. Facebook is also opening up the format to advertisers, with the first batch of “immersive stories” coming from AT&T, Corona, Nescafe, Ritz Crackers, Samsung and Walt Disney World.

What Brands Need To Do
When Facebook first introduced spherical videos to its news feed, we expected Facebook to open this video format to branded content soon, which is now confirmed with those aforementioned “branded stories.” Distributing your branded VR-style videos through Facebook can help attract an audience seeking new media experiences and engage them with the added interactivity. For brands looking to stay ahead of the curve, now would be the time to start building a library of 360-degree content that is accessible across devices.

 

Source: TechCrunch

Header image is a promotional image courtesy of Facebook

Facebook Launches Notify App To Lend Its Notification Center Reach

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
On Wednesday, Facebook rolled out a new iOS app called “Notify” to allow users to receive push notifications from publishers and other brands of their choice. Upon logging in with Facebook account, users are asked to follow “stations” that they are interested in, which include a variety of content publishers such as BuzzFeed, CNN, Vogue, Getty Images, and The Weather Channel, plus Groupon and Fandango. The notifications will direct users to designated web pages where they can consume the content or, in Groupon’s case, find more about its Deal of the Day.

What Brands Need To Do
Although Facebook does not feature any ads in Notify for now, there are certainly opportunities to offer sponsored “station” suggestions for users to follow. From a content marketing perspective, this new app can offer brands a new channel to stay connected to consumers and deliver their branded content. Not every brand has the resources to develop their own app and incentivize customers to download it, and Notify can provide those brands with an alternative way to infiltrate the lock screen and reach consumers via notifications.  

 

Source: The Verge

Header image is a promotional image courtesy of Facebook Newsroom