#TWIMshow - This Week in Marketing

In 14 minutes, get up to speed on the must-know Digital Marketing updates from the week of 23rd August 2021.

Show Notes

1. Ads in Instagram Shop Tab Roll Out Globally - After testing them out over the last few weeks, Instagram is now rolling out its new promoted products option within the Shop tab to all merchants in the app. Brands with product listings in the app will now be able to promote them on the Shop tab, with a 'Sponsored' disclaimer marking the paid posts. Clicking on a sponsored product will take users through to a product details page, where they'll be able to learn more about the item. The details page will also highlight additional products from that brand. Users will also be able to save sponsored product listings to a wishlist, or share them with friends from the details page.

The addition is part of Instagram's broader eCommerce shift, which involves slowly teaching users to expect that they'll be able to shop for items from images within the app. And as Instagram learns more about each users' shopping preferences, and the product that they like, the Shop tab will become more valuable, again increasing the potential of this new addition. At the least, it may well be worth an experiment for those that are looking to tap into Instagram's billion-user audience. 

The new Instagram Promoted Products option is rolling out in countries where the Instagram Shop tab is available.


2. Instagram Shared How Search Algorithms Work, And How You Can Optimize Your Presence - Instagram has published the second installment in its new 'How Instagram Works' series, with an overview of how its search algorithms function, and how you can maximize your chances of showing up in relevant search results. 

The first post in the series looked at how Instagram's feed ranking works, providing more oversight into how the platform looks to match relevant content with user interests, and how creators can ensure their posts reach people in the app. 

The basics of Instagram search are fairly straightforward - Instagram uses the keywords that you enter into the search field to highlight the most relevant content, with the specific text that you input being the primary matching device.

But that's not the only factor - when providing relevant search matches for a query, Instagram factors in three primary elements:
  • The text you enter - This, Instagram says, is "by far" the most important signal for Search. "We try to match what you type with relevant usernames, bios, captions, hashtags and places".
  • Your activity in the app - In addition to basic text matching, Instagram will also rank your search results based on your previous in-app activity, including the accounts you follow, the posts you've viewed, and how you've interacted with certain profiles in the past. "We usually show accounts and hashtags you follow or visit higher than those you don’t". This is to help you find things that you're more likely to be interested in, and to streamline your discovery process.
  • Popularity of each query - Finally, Instagram also factors in the popularity of the matches for your query when ranking the results it displays. The elements that could influence this include the number of clicks, likes, shares and follows that a particular account, hashtag or place sees
It is worth noting that re-sharing memes might get you likes, but it might also penalize you in discovery, while Instagram also actively seeks to limit the reach, at least in a discovery sense, of contest/giveaway posts.


3. Facebook Publishes New Christmas Marketing Guide to Assist with Campaign Planning - With Christmas now only 120 some days away, Facebook has published a new Christmas Marketing Guide to help guide your strategic planning, and map out a more effective approach based on key shopping behaviors and events. 

The 18-page guide is geared around what Facebook's calling its 'Discovery Commerce System', a process that utilizes Facebook's ad matching tools to optimize your marketing approach, based on four steps.

For each step, Facebook provides practical recommendations on how you can put it into action, and how that will then contribute to your broader marketing goals.

For example, in the first step - 'Personalization Engine' - Facebook provides a range of tips on how you can personalize your outreach by using tools like the Facebook Pixel and the Conversions API.

The guide essentially provides quick tips for each element, and links to read more about how you can enact them within your strategy.


4. TikTok and Shopify introduce TikTok Shopping -
TikTok is expanding its relationship with Shopify to provide more ways for Shopify merchants to promote their products direct to their audience in the app.

Today, TikTok has announced a new shop tab expansion for Shopify merchant profiles, which, as it sounds, will add a new product display showcase to your in-app presence. 

So it's not direct, in-stream shopping, as such, with users referred back to the merchant's Shopify store for purchase. But it's another big step in TikTok's broader eCommerce push, facilitating direct product promotion within a dedicated storefront space, which is very similar to Instagram's in-app Shops option

The real winners,are Shopify merchants, who now have another way to directly promote their products within another social app - but for TikTok, it's another advance that will help it maximize its business potential, and provide more ways for users to more directly monetize their TikTok presence.


5. How to Analyze Your Snapchat Ads Campaign Performance - Not only is measuring campaign performance an exciting moment when you’re working hard to advertise your business, but it’s critical to understanding what has worked well, what might not be working as well, so you can best adjust your marketing to optimize towards your goals. 

So Snapchat wrote a blog post, covering everything you need to know about analyzing your advertising campaigns on Snapchat - from how to set advertising goals, how to analyze campaign performance against your marketing and business goals, to how to create custom reports in Snapchat’s Ads Manager to streamline and automate your performance reporting.

Checkout the post here: https://forbusiness.snapchat.com/blog/how-to-analyze-your-snapchat-ads-campaign-performance 


6. Twitter Publishes New Twitter Ads Checklist to Help Guide Your Approach -
Twitter has published a new one-page checklist of all the key considerations for effective tweet ad campaigns, including hashtag notes, media attachment tips and targeting pointers.

The checklist is an extension of Twitter’s recently published Agency Playbook, a 41-page guide that covers all aspects of Twitter marketing. And while the notes are aimed at agency staffers specifically, the checklist does cover all the key info that you need to build effective tweet ad campaigns.

You can download Twitter’s full Agency Playbook here, or check out the list below.


7. LinkedIn Publishes New Guide on Using Organic and Paid Strategies to Maximize Branding Impact -
LinkedIn has published a helpful new guide which looks at the branding benefits of using paid and organic outreach in combination, and how you can best pair these elements for different purposes using LinkedIn’s tools.

The 45-page guide includes insights into all aspects of building your brand on LinkedIn, and a range of helpful pointers to guide your strategy. You can download the full guide here


8. Google's "How Search Works" Website - This week, the search giant has published an updated version of its 'How Search Works' website, which includes a range of insights and links to provide more information about its ever-evolving ranking algorithms, which could help you better understand what you should be doing to match-up with its systems. 

The mini-site covers all aspects of Google's search process and it does help to provide more insight into Google's ranking processes, and what it looks for in web content.

Google includes basic overviews of each ranking element, including, for example, why it uses automated keyword matching.

"Every day, fifteen per cent of searches are ones that we haven't seen before, so we use automated systems to get you the most relevant and reliable information that we can find. To help you find what you're looking for, these systems consider many factors, including the words in your query, the content of pages, the expertise of sources, and your language and location."

The site also includes basic pointers on keyword usage, and how its algorithms rank keyword match relevance based on each query:

"For example, with web pages, if those keywords appear on the page, or if they appear in the headings or body of the text, the information might be more relevant."

It also outlines the fundamentals of backlinks, and how Google factors in the value of links in ranking:

"One of several factors that we use to help determine this is understanding if other prominent websites link or refer to the content. This has often proven to be a good sign that the information is well trusted." 

But as anyone who's ever tried to stay on top of SEO knows, that information can change quickly. Indeed, Google notes that it made over 4,500 search 'improvements' in 2020 alone. 


9. Google Is Updating The Way It Generates Web Page Titles In Search Results - Google’s Danny Sullivan confirms the search engine is updating the way it generates web page titles in search results.

“Last week, we introduced a new system of generating titles for web pages. Before this, titles might change based on the query issued. This generally will no longer happen with our new system. This is because we think our new system is producing titles that work better for documents overall, to describe what they are about, regardless of the particular query.”

Google’s new system of generating web page titles has been documented extensively since it was discovered in live search results last week.

Google’s Danny Sullivan confirms the search engine is updating the way it generates web page titles in search results.

“Last week, we introduced a new system of generating titles for web pages. Before this, titles might change based on the query issued. This generally will no longer happen with our new system. This is because we think our new system is producing titles that work better for documents overall, to describe what they are about, regardless of the particular query.”

Google’s new system of generating web page titles has been documented extensively since it was discovered in live search results last week.

If you’re wondering whether it’s still worth your time to create unique titles for your pages, the answer is 100% yes.

Don’t just leave it up to Google. Sullivan says original HTML title tags will still be used over 80% of the time.

What is #TWIMshow - This Week in Marketing?

This Week in Marketing is a weekly roundup of all the notable latest developments that you need to know to stay on top of your Digital Marketing game.