The ever-evolving nature of social media platforms is a result of their constant efforts to cater to the changing needs of users. The latest updates expected this month will bring about a more enhanced user experience, the introduction of new features, and algorithm updates that will influence the content displayed on our feeds.
In today’s world, where social media has established itself as a significant aspect of our digital lives, staying up-to-date with the latest trends and changes is essential to optimize our social media experience.
Let’s see what these updates are.
- Twitter 2.0 is gearing up for the next stage of its subscription revenue drive, as the platform has declared that it will start revoking “legacy” blue verification badges from April 1 2023. Additionally, participation in Twitter polls will be restricted to Twitter Blue members, considerably limiting the visibility of non-paying accounts and reducing the overall functionality for regular users.
2. Starting April 15th, 2023, only Twitter Blue subscribers’ tweets will be suggested in the primary feed.
- Instagram introduces a collaborative collections feature which lets you save reels and posts with friends.
- Instagram is developing a new feature to assist users in celebrating their birthdays. The feature is a unique photo effect that would be visible on a user’s profile for the duration of their special day.
3. As Reels continues to gain traction on Instagram and Facebook, Meta is introducing fresh advertising options to help advertisers maximise their promotional prospects within short-form video clips.
4. Instagram is testing a new method to merge Stories and Reels. The trial involves certain Reels being played in their entirety within the Stories stream.
- During its presentation at ShopTalk 2023, Pinterest unveiled some new enhancements to aid retailers in optimizing their opportunities within the app. The updates include catalogue display through product feed ingestion, wider availability of its ‘Premiere Spotlight’ advertisements, and the capability for users to shop via creations within its distinct Shuffles app.
- Pinterest has revealed a new video partnership deal with Dotdash Meredith, a publisher that will bring content from various prominent lifestyle brands to the platform.
- Meta has released a fresh set of inventory filters for Facebook and Instagram Feeds that will offer brands an effortless approach to avoid unwanted connections with possibly offensive or undesirable content.
- Meta has revealed two new ad formats currently in the testing phase during its presentation at ShopTalk 2023. The first is managed partner ads that offer businesses an additional option for utilising their CRM data for targeting. The second is local inventory promotions that provide more focused targeting capabilities.
- Meta has incorporated several new features into its Safety Hub mini-site to improve the visibility of its diverse safety resources for journalists and public figures across its apps.
- LinkedIn has introduced a fresh feature that enables forwarding a LinkedIn feed post to several members simultaneously. Additionally, forwarding a post will allow you to create a new group message. Recently, LinkedIn also introduced new DM tagging capabilities to help classify your messages, along with its ‘Focused Inbox’ feature that separates inbox messages into ‘Featured’ and ‘Other’ folders, streamlining engagement.
- LinkedIn is introducing a new native post-scheduling feature and enabling company pages to follow other pages on the app. These updates are part of the platform’s latest feature release.
As per LinkedIn:
“As a marketer, we know it takes time and resources to strategize, create, and publish content in order to reach your audience. To help you manage and share content at the right time, you can now select the specific date and time for your Page posts to go live, all within the platform.”
Snapchat
Snap is endeavouring to facilitate more businesses to adopt AR and interactive digital experiences through the rollout of its new AR Enterprise Services (ARES) platform. The platform will furnish brands with the requisite tools and guidance to integrate Snap’s AR technology into their own websites, apps, and physical locations.
Snap’s ARES platform will offer third-party platforms access to three AR elements, namely 3D Viewer, AR Try-On, and Fit Finder. These tools in combination will allow brands to incorporate AR virtual try-on experiences into their own processes, which could be a significant advancement in integrating captivating and interactive digital components into their processes.
These app updates demonstrate the continued evolution of social media platforms to provide more value to both users and businesses alike.
With new features like native post scheduling on LinkedIn, inventory filters on Facebook and Instagram, and managed partner ads on Meta, businesses can optimize their promotions and engagement strategies.
Meanwhile, new functionalities like the birthday photo effect on Instagram and the integration of Reels and Stories on the app can enhance the user experience.
As the competition among social media platforms intensifies, it is likely that we will continue to see more updates and innovations to meet the needs and preferences of users and businesses.
