Stories, Filters, and Bots: What You Need to Know Now

Live stories and live video replay Like many other social channels, you can livestream using Instagram Stories. Sponsored stories The Canvas ad format popular on Facebook is now available on Instagram. Facebook & Facebook Messenger While Facebook has a couple billion users, it has several features that have not been used to their full potential. Chatbots Chatbots are a new way for users to interact with brands on Facebook. For marketers, Medium is a work in progress – though some brands are setting up content channels on Medium since the transition from advertising to subscriptions. A smaller number of companies even forgo a company-hosted blog in favor of a Medium channel to save on development costs and to benefit from the Medium network effect. Want to see what a brand channel looks like on Medium? Let me repeat that: More people are spending time interacting through messaging apps than are interacting and posting on the major social media sites. Kardos admits her company’s use of chatbots is a bit of an experiment in keeping with Convince and Convert’s passion for trying new tools to keep its audience informed. Get the latest and uncover the hidden features on social media as well as other content marketing channels.

Author: Monina Wagner / Source: Content Marketing Institute

Editor’s note: This post was co-written by Clare McDermott, Mantis Research co-founder and chief research officer.

Keeping up with what’s new and exciting in social media can feel like a sprint. Just as you’ve mastered a new tactic or tool, one of the major social networks announces a new feature you need to wrap your head around. Find some new (and not so new) features you may not know, as well as a few channels that may not be on your radar.

Snapchat

Filters vs. lenses

What’s the difference? The two terms are often used interchangeably, but they don’t mean the same thing. Filters are static images you add to a photo on Snapchat – like a company-sponsored illustration to commemorate a special event. Lenses add animation to your Snapchat photo or video – often using augmented reality (AR). For example, you can transform your face into an AR-enabled kitten face (but please don’t) or add an animated rain cloud to your video. The opportunity for followers to engage with lenses is much higher than with filters because users are more likely to play with them and share them.

Audience lenses

Want to ensure that you’re getting the right impressions on Snapchat? The platform’s audience-lenses feature lets you customize your target market by regions – guaranteeing a number of impressions by age, gender, and lifestyle in that area.

Geofilters

Want to make sure your audience members share their experience with your brand? Create a custom geofilter only available to users within a geographic location you define (cost is determined by the size of the area and length of filter’s availability). Geofilters are a great option for events, retail locations, and destinations.

Snap Map

This new feature lets a user see if any friends are close by. When turned on, Snap Map shares the user’s location – a boon for advertisers who can leverage the information. So far there’s no ad offer for Snap Map, but we won’t be surprised if that comes soon.

Instagram

In April 2017, the number of people using Instagram Stories surpassed the number using Snapchat stories, making it a must-use channel for many marketers. But do you know about some of its key features for businesses?

Live stories and live video replay

Like many other social channels, you can livestream using Instagram Stories. Instagram also lets users replay the video for 24 hours.

Add a link

This option is available for business accounts with over 10,000 followers. Before publishing your story, click the paper clip icon and add a relevant URL. When it’s published, your story will include a “swipe up” to follow the link. (Savvy marketers add visual cues to their story to emphasize the swipe-up option.)

Polling

Now you can add a two-answer poll sticker to your Instagram Stories. After tapping an answer, users see poll results right away.

Facebook & Facebook Messenger

While Facebook has a couple billion users, it has several features that have not been used to their full potential.

Facebook Canvas

These are interactive mobile ads that offer advertisers much greater flexibility to promote content assets. Luke Kintigh from Intel explains, “For our online publication, iQ, we use Canvas to show photo galleries, vertical video, tilt-to-pan images, pull quotes, GIFs, and other assets that lead users to our site. The Canvas units are unique in that they can contain pretty much everything you can or would put in a microsite or landing page – all in mobile.”