News Feed Update: A New Look and Feel for Facebook's News Feed

As you've probably already noticed, Facebook has updated the News Feed for users. As they announced last week, the changes in the look and feel will help to provide a more consistent experience across desktop and mobile platforms. For the most part, it's just a new look, but here's a run-down of what's new (and what's not).

What's New:

• Larger images
• Fonts
• Bookmark icons
• Stories housed within "cards" in the feed
• Timestamps under the Page or user's name
• Same sizing for organic stories and ads
• Multi-photo Page posts (all multi-photo stories will honor the orientation of the first photo in the series and will not be distinguished from the format of a photo album)

What's Not New:

• General layout
• Navigation
• News Feed's algorithm that determines what you see and when
• Creative specs and image aspect ratios for Facebook Ads or Promoted Posts (including the 20% text rule)

Check out the changes and let me know what you think in the comments.

News Feed Update: Facebook’s Algorithm Pushes Posts Most Relevant to User Interests through Tagging

After Facebook’s latest algorithm change gave preference to personal status updates over brand status updates, the social network is throwing brands a bone: more reach for their most relevant posts. Starting this week, brand posts that tag other brands may be shown to followers of both brand pages. Much like a user’s friends will see that they’ve been tagged in posts by other (non-mutual) friends, Facebook followers of brand pages may see posts that the brand has been tagged in by other brands, including press outlets, sponsors, strategic partners, competitors, and more. For example, Facebook followers of Advertising Week will naturally see the Page’s posts, plus posts from other brands that tag Advertising Week – even if they do not follow the other brand on the platform.

As Facebook Product Manager Andrew Song explained in a Facebook Newsroom post,

“We look at many factors to make sure the most relevant stories appear in News Feed, including which posts are getting the most engagement (such as likes, comments, shares and clicks) across all of Facebook. We also consider which posts are getting the most engagement from people who like both the Page that posted and the Page that was tagged.”

This new algorithmic update comes after users expressed that they liked seeing this kind of relevant content in their News Feeds when Facebook tested the feature for Pages, Song said. It’s an interesting move for Facebook, given that this feature could easily be abused by brands that want a little extra reach by leveraging a big, but irrelevant name. But more than that, it’s a great opportunity for brands to make their posts more relevant to their current and future audiences. Here’s how:

1. Brands that leverage existing partnerships on local, national, and global levels can connect with the audiences that they most want to reach. This means that brands small and large will more clearly benefit from sponsorship, partnership, and overall collaboration in the social media world.
2. Brands can create better brand associations based on the relevant interests of their audience. For example, if a brand like Stonyfield Farms posts about its corporate stance on GMO labeling, tagging the Environmental Working Group that created a guide to help shoppers avoid genetically engineered foods will help to create a stronger connection between the two brands and their values.
3. Brands can demonstrate differences between themselves and their competition by tagging their competitors in posts that compare them. Prego’s latest campaign to differentiate themselves from Ragu through taste testing could easily extend to social channels. By leveraging Facebook tagging to show the results of their taste test to the followers of both brands, they could more clearly show that one brand is superior to the other and even drive conversions of sales.

It will be interesting to see the creative ways that brand strategists and community managers leverage this newest algorithm change to benefit their brands.

Originally posted on the Advertising Week Social Club here.

#SMWNYC Recap: The Future of Social Media and Content Creation

For the second year in a row, I made the trek from the City of Brotherly Love to the Big Apple for Social Media Week NYC. In two days of SMW sessions, expert panelists from socially savvy agencies and brands discussed continuously changing social media platforms, revolutionary content strategies, and evolving analytics. Check out the key takeaways from select sessions below and, if you were in attendance at #SMWNYC, let me know what findings you found most valuable in the comments!

The Language of Social Media is Visual

The internet was built on text. From search engine algorithms and queries to website and application coding, words have defined and shaped the digital experience. But, as JWT Trends Strategist Will Palley pointed out in a session on Thursday called Reading is No Longer Fundamental: The Shift to Visual Vocabulary, “new social platforms force people to learn new languages.” Increasingly, those languages are not always (or only) verbal. With the rise of platforms like Pinterest and Instagram, the language of social media is evolving from words (and even limited characters) to images. DigitasLBi SVP and North American Mobile Practice Lead Chia Chen said in The Changing Face of News Consumption, Hosted by WSJ, “The currency of social media is imagery.” As users increasingly turn to animated stickers and emoji to communicate, brands need to evolve to learn from, understand, and embrace these languages – to “listen visually,” said Palley. But how?

“We need to restore context to content,” said Curalate CEO and Co-Founder Apu Gupta. That context can come from comments, emoji, metadata, and more. While users may be pinning your brand’s products or posting photos of your signage on Instagram, it’s important to understand the users, read their posts, and know that they could be sharing the content because they love it or because they hate it. Brands have the opportunity to create that context by inviting consumers to participate in the content creation process. Rather than simply taking and repurposing user-generated content, Craig Hepburn, global head of digital & social at Nokia, recommends that brands start building relationships with (but not paying for the involvement of) key influencers. Curalate's Gupta cited a really amazing example of work with Urban Outfitters, which leveraged user-generated content to create a digital experience based on the real style of its customers on its homepage. But the best part wasn't the "influence" of the customers featured on UO's website – it was their enthusiasm. "We talk so much about influencer marketing, but that's to the detriment of loyalists," Gupta explained. The success of the efforts to incorporate visual user-generated content depends largely on the type of brand and the type of consumer, but one thing is for sure: the visual language of social media is still in its infancy and it will only continue to grow and change.

The Evolution of Content Creation and Sharing

Propelled by changes in consumption habits and platform preferences, storytelling has changed forever. Still, there are great opportunities and challenges for community managers and content creators of all kinds, but they've evolved with the times and with us. "Most people have thought of stories as having a beginning, middle and end," said Jim Roberts, executive editor and chief content officer of Mashable. "For the consumer who has time to consume it, it's a really rewarding experience, but most people don't have time to do that anymore." Now, brands and media companies are being forced to tailor their content to evolving consumer preferences.

Liz Heron, emerging media editor at The Wall Street Journal, explained that content, especially content targeted to millennials, needs to be characterized by three things: presence and share-ability on social and mobile platforms, rich visuals, and emotional relevance and resonance. And really, in a sea of content that is constantly fighting for our attention and our love, that couldn't be more accurate. Without content that tugs at the heartstrings and engages with imagery on the social and mobile channels at our fingertips, media companies and brands cannot hope to connect with modern consumers. "The pace of change that we experienced... in the '90s was nothing compared to the pace of change in recent years," said Roberts. Clearly social media trends are leading the way forward and show no sign of slowing down.

News Feed Update: Facebook Favors Status Updates From Users – But Not From Pages

Facebook's at it again – changing up the News Feed algorithm that controls what users see and when they see it. In this case, it means more text status updates from friends and fewer from Pages. In the latest post from Facebook Newsroom, the social media giant explains:

Through testing, we have found that when people see more text status updates on Facebook they write more status updates themselves. In fact, in our initial test when we showed more status updates from friends it led to on average 9 million more status updates written each day...

Over time, we noticed that this effect wasn't true for text status updates from Pages. As a result, the latest update to News Feed ranking treats text status updates from Pages as a different category to text status updates from friends.

This makes sense, given that Facebook users certainly interact differently with their friends than they do with the brand and interest Pages they like and follow. This algorithm change will cater to that difference and show more text updates from friends and more visual content from Pages. But what does this mean for community managers, social media strategists, and brand managers?

1. Expect to see a drop in reach (and therefore, engagement) for text-only status updates from Pages. Armed with this knowledge, community managers and social strategists can help to educate clients and partners about the best kinds of content to post to ensure that overall reach and engagement metrics are not affected.
2. Use link-shares to add value to traditional status updates. According to Facebook, "The best way to share a link after this update will be to use a link-share.... We've found that, as compared to sharing links by embedding in status updates, these posts get more engagement (more likes, comments, shares and clicks) and they provide a more visual and compelling experience for people seeing them in their feeds."
3. Focus on delivering visual, valuable content. Whether it's a photo, video, or link, the content posted to Facebook should be attractive, relevant, and timely. Use Facebook Insights to determine the best kinds of posts for your Pages (historically) and consider adjusting future content to fit the timing, focus, and type of your best-performing posts.

Ultimately, the text-only status update will not go away for Pages – but it's clear that other types of posts must be a key part of the content strategy in order for brand content to stand out from user content in Facebook's News Feed.

Takeaways from PR News' #digitalpr Summit

On October 16, I joined two of my fellow LevLane-rs for a little learning about social media, reputation management, SEO, measurement, and leadership at PR News' Digital PR Summit in New York City. After searching the Grand Hyatt's digital agenda and map to find our conference location, we briefly considered trying to join the Super Bowl's planning meeting before grabbing a quick muffin and our seats in the ballroom. For the most part, the speakers had great experiences to share and insights from which we could all learn. The most important takeaways for me, as a Social Media Manager in an agency, can be found below, in both narrative and infographic. This conference recap is not exhaustive, obviously – I want to be "at the table, not on the menu," as American Traffic Solutions' SVP of Public Affairs and Marketing Communications Charlie Territo so eloquently put it. If you were in attendance for #digitalpr, I'd love to know what you found most valuable. Let me know in the comments!

How to Measure and Communicate Social Media ROI

In this session, EVP, BurrellesLuce Johna Burke cited a rather groundbreaking statistic from Nielsen: In the past, brands had to communicate messages 3-6 times in order for them to really sink in with consumers. Later, that number increased to 8 times. Today, with the message, platform, and product clutter that defines our lives, brands must reach millennials 23 times in order for brand messages to resonate. Whoa.

Get Your Messages in Front of the Right Followers on Twitter

One of my favorite quotes of the day came from Brooke Primero, SVP, PR & Marketing for the Academy of Country Music. She said, "The kiss of death in social media is being a 9-5, Monday-Friday brand." No matter what brand you're promoting, social activity doesn't sleep and it certainly doesn't stop because it's 6:30PM on a Tuesday. The Academy of Country Music's biggest push of the year is for a 3-hour awards event once a year. That's it. So they focused their efforts on building that brand during the rest of the year via social channels. In 2011, they announced their award nominees on TV, reaching 3 million people, according to CBS. In 2012, they took to Twitter to announce the nominees and reached 14.2 million people. Those are some pretty amazing statistics, but the Academy of Country Music didn't stop there. They engaged with key influencers to grow across Twitter and gave them behind the scenes access to content to take them from influencers to brand ambassadors.

How to Engage with the Internet's Passionate Communities

If there's one thing I learned during this session, it's this: some people just don't get reddit. Half of this session was spent listening to the great brand integration stories about reddit, and the other half of the session was spent trying to explain what reddit is. My life, in that moment, was r/reddit. Still, it was interesting to hear Marta Gossage, community operations manager, and Victoria Taylor, director of communications, distinguish reddit from other social platforms: Platforms like Facebook and Twitter show off your "frontstage behavior" (the way you want to portray yourself to the world), while platforms like reddit show off your "backstage behavior" (the way you think and feel when you're eating potato chips by the fistful in your sweatpants, reading the AMA with a guy who lost 300+ pounds through extreme starvation). reddit seems to be a much more authentic platform in that way – and redditors keep it that way. At the table we shared in the back, Gossage described reddit as having its own immune system. If there's a foreign body in there, the community reacts strongly to defend its territory (...er, place on the interwebz). Plus, if all else fails for you on reddit, you can always end a post with "...and here's a picture of my cat" to help you get your footing.

How to Use Instagram, Pinterest, and Vine for Digital Storytelling

If you've been trying to figure out how to build a brand presence on one of the more visual social platforms, this was a great session for you. Amanda Junker, digital director for Shape Magazine, spelled out how to drive better results and greater brand relevancy through SEO on Pinterest. Her tips? Display the "Pin It" button prominently on your web properties, verify brand accounts, complete the "About" profile section, name all pinned graphics appropriately, and create boards that capture long-tail searches. She also recommended infogr.am, which I used to create the infographic below. After her part was over, Allison Robins, Director of Global Public Relations at Zumba Fitness, stepped up to discuss Instagram's power and limits. According to Robins, Instagram is not the best platforms for brands focused on ROI, conversions, and sales. Instead, it's better for brand and relationship building. And if you've been wondering how to upload pre-recorded videos to Vine, Doug Simon, President & CEO, D S Simon Productions, was your guy. Simply edit your video in a program like Final Cut and convert it to an H.264 mp4 file, compress it, email it to yourself, then upload it to Instagram or Vine. It's that easy!

Building, Motivating, and Managing Your Digital Dream Team

Hands-down, this was the most valuable part of the day for me. Gemma Craven, EVP, NY group director, Social@Ogilvy, explained exactly how the growth of digital and social has shaped the creation and make-up of agency and client teams. Some of these teams may be as large as 20 people, handling digital and social creative, strategy, community management, analytics and listening, production, and more. More than metrics, more than C-suite buy-in, this is what I feel is the most important piece of the digital and social puzzle for agencies and brands today.

Did anything surprise you?

Graph Search Updates Could Help Facebook Compete with Twitter

In a move to help the largest social network compete with Twitter, Facebook announced an update to Graph Search that enables users to search status updates, comments, and posts shared with them by friends. While the new feature won't necessarily have people posting as feverishly about live events (like the Emmy's or the "Breaking Bad" finale) as they would on Twitter, this function will allow community managers to track  posts by users about their brands, especially TV shows that people are talking about in real-time. Posts made by private users will not be available for non-friends or brands to review.

The functionality isn't live for all users at this time, so here's an example to make it a little clearer: if you wanted to know what your friends thought of the "Breaking Bad" finale, you could search for "Posts about Breaking Bad by my friends" within the last week. Then, all status updates, comments made on status updates, photos and photo comments posted mentioning "Breaking Bad" would show up in your Facebook search results.

It's a good move on Facebook's part, seeing as their hashtags seem to have fallen a little flat. We'll see if this update can help them compete with Twitter's recently-announced ad partnerships with CBS and the NFL, which will put real-time video into your Twitter feed.

New Facebook Metric Helps Telecommunications Brands Better Measure ROI

Facebook just launched a new tool to help telecommunications companies (like mobile carriers and operators) measure success on their platform. It's been tough to track the correlation between ad impressions and mobile phone sales, as the transaction typically occurs in a store, rather than online. This, of course, is not unique to telecommunications brands, so Facebook may be rolling out similar metrics for other kinds of companies in the future. In their announcement, Facebook explains why they've created this new metric:

Though clicks can be an effective indicator of interaction with Facebook content, they are less useful for linking digital impressions to in-store sales. In fact, our measurement team found that in telecommunications campaigns, more than 90% of people who made a purchase after viewing an ad on Facebook had never clicked on that ad.

The new metric, called "Telco Outcome Measurement," relies on Facebook's mobile reach to correlate ad exposure to actual sales, and to provide more valuable insight into ROI for Facebook ads. It's an interesting metric and one that, if successful, could be applied or modified to provide better information to several other kinds of businesses – not just telecommunications.