This Week in Digital Marketing - July 22, 2022

This week in digital marketing, Instagram launched payments in chat, Google allowed election advertisements on YouTube, and Amazon Prime Day significantly increased e-commerce.

Prime Day Contributed To Significant E-Commerce Growth This Year
According to the Adobe Digital Economy Index, Amazon Prime Day, a two-day event hosted this year on July 12 and 13, performed 8.5 percent better than it did the year before. The first day's total online sales in the United States were $6 billion, and the second day's were $5.9 billion.

Despite inflation and other factors like increasing gas prices and travel, booming e-commerce sales from this year's promotions demonstrate that online consumers are prepared to take advantage of discounts across a variety of product categories.

Google Allows Election Ads On Youtube And Updates Its Political Content Policy
The Google Ads Political Content Policy will be modified the following month, and advertisers will thereafter be forced to provide additional "Paid for by" disclosure information immediately in the advertisement.

Beginning the next month, advertisers that run political advertising will have to abide by the new guidelines in order to avoid having their ads rejected or their accounts blocked. Although I recognize and support Google's efforts to promote transparency, I'm not sure that a "Paid for by" notice is as crucial as putting an end to false information.

Instagram Announces Payments In Chat
Today, Mark Zuckerberg revealed that you could place orders from small businesses and follow them via Instagram chat.

You merely message the qualified company you want to purchase from. The company sets up a payment link where you may make a purchase, watch the progress of your transaction, and post further queries. Additionally, Meta Pay will be enabled to make the checkout process simpler.

Instead of the conventional multi-step method of clicking between pages or websites, the payments in chat functionality streamlines the buying process for the customer. As a result, seller conversion rates need to rise. Buyers and advertisers should use caution while utilizing this payment option because bogus pages still exist.

Open The Gate And Let Your Content Roam Free
According to a new survey by 6Sense Research, a provider of B2B revenue enhancement and ABM solutions, only 3% of visitors will complete out an on-site form. Furthermore, it isn't the only issue B2B companies have with content. One of the most effective demand generators, according to one-third of businesses, is content marketing. Despite this, just 55% of businesses can supply information tailored to a customer's specific interests. Nobody enjoys completing online forms. Marketers can learn this from their own experiences. Additionally, no one enjoys receiving all the spam emails you do.

Google Ads, AdSense, Analytics, And Other Platforms Suffering Reporting Outages, Again
Another reporting outage affecting Google's numerous ad networks is causing significant delays for the Google Ads panel, Google AdSense reporting, Google Analytics dashboards, and other services.

Inaccurate reporting results in inaccuracy in optimization, alterations, and adjustments. Check your dashboard for advertisements. You might wish to delay making any significant modifications until the problem has been fixed if your figures appear to be off.

(NOTE: This issue has since been resolved by Google, however, it’s still a good reminder to keep a close eye on your reporting.)

YouTube Partners With Shopify To Deliver Shopping Tools For Creators, Brands
The explore tab on YouTube will have a new retail location starting the next week. The page will have relevant content from US, Brazilian, and Indian creators that may be purchased.

The ability to display products across channels will be available to creators who link their stores. To make sure that product inventory is constantly current, Shopify will carry out real-time inventory syncing. US content makers can even allow in-app purchasing so that viewers can make purchases without leaving the channel.

Brands and creators may now compete with Amazon in more ways than ever before. Make sure to connect your store to YouTube Shopping if you're a creator or brand with a Shopify store and you're eligible for the service.

Marketers Investing Big In Influencer Marketing
In the upcoming 3-6 months, 74% of marketers expect to dedicate at least a quarter of their social media spending to working with content creators.

There are roughly 50 million people who identify as creators, and there are countless options for them to make money off of their material and work with brands.

Creators have the advantage thanks to all of the various platforms and functionalities that are being introduced. Using artists could aid your business in gaining followers, trust, and engagement if you have the funding and the ability to profit from marketing campaigns with an authentic voice.

New Searchable Instagram Map Gives Visibility To Local Businesses
Today, Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, unveiled a searchable Instagram map through an Instagram Story. With the aid of this new map, users can find well-liked nearby establishments and filter results by categories like hotels or restaurants.

Google has disclosed that Instagram has emerged as a significant rival. Nearly 40% of younger users (aged 18 to 24) find companies on Instagram and TikTok rather than through Google Maps or search.

Federal Data Privacy Bill Could Make Life Easier For Marketers
Marketers may benefit from a new data privacy measure (H.R. 8152), despite the fact that it makes targeted advertising more challenging. The American Data Privacy and Protection Act (ADDPA), which would supersede current state privacy laws, would offer a comprehensive national privacy standard. As a result, rather than the 13 rules that are currently in place, marketers would only need to abide by one.

The United States needs a national data privacy law for a variety of reasons. This would relieve marketers of the need to treat data differently depending on the state it is functioning in. While the ADDPA is still a long way from being legislation, let's hope that soon some kind of national standard is established.

Google Starts Automatically Upgrading Smart Shopping Campaigns To Performance Max
Google has started implementing improvements that automatically transform Smart Shopping campaigns into Performance Max. The changes will end for the majority of marketers in September. About 2-3 weeks before the changes go into effect, Google will issue a notification with a deadline for when your campaigns will be converted.

Automatic updates are never enjoyable if you are unaware of them. Since the "one-click" upgrade option is currently accessible, we advise converting your campaigns on your own rather than relying on Google. As a result, you ought to have more control over the settings and visibility into how the campaign is actually configured. Although Google states that the lessons from your Smart Shopping campaigns will transfer, it's important to take no chances.

Google Search People Also Ask Feature Returns To Normal
The saturation of the "people also ask" search option on Google appears to have been returned to normal. The frequency of the "people also ask" box appearing in Google Search decreased by around 30% earlier this month. About 60% of desktop queries as of today morning display the users also ask search box once more.

The "people also ask" box is not only a helpful tool for searchers to expand and refine their queries, but search marketers also adore it. The people also ask function can be used to generate content and keyword suggestions. It can assist you in creating fresh material that might rank for and appear in Google's highlighted snippets.

Linkedin Business Manager Is Now In Public Beta
The launch of LinkedIn Business Manager for public beta was ultimately announced in June and took place yesterday. Advertisers that manage multiple ad accounts may now create and amend campaigns, manage pages, grant access to ad accounts and pages, and create reports using the new business manager dashboard.

This launch is long delayed because maintaining separate LinkedIn sites and ad accounts is a cumbersome process. But as their product team points out, the beta designation enables them to continuously add and test new features. Watch your accounts carefully in the near future for any more upgrades and modifications.

Facebook Home Tab To Show More Content Recommendations
Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, has revealed two important updates to the Facebook app that will give it characteristics of both TikTok and "Facebook classic."

Reels and Stories will be given increased prominence in the Home tab's tailored content recommendations. Users will be able to view postings from friends, groups, and Pages in reverse chronological order via a new Feeds tab.

This can turn out to be a massive "meh" or it might be a sizable opportunity for marketers. Advertising shouldn't be affected by this move because Facebook Ads will still show up in the News Feed. However, if video content has sufficient engagement and gives the correct signals to Facebook's machine-learning algorithms, it has the potential to go viral.

TikTok’s History Of Low Creator Fund Payouts Has Some Leaving The Platform For Good
Due to their dissatisfaction with the amount of money they receive from TikTok's Creator Fund, creators are abandoning the app and blaming it for their mental health problems and fatigue.

Since the company promised to pay out a total of $1 billion over a three-year period, a number of creators have challenged TikTok for its inadequate rewards. Creators like Hank Green assert that they receive between $0.02 and $0.03 for every thousand views on their videos. In order to put things into perspective, YouTube creators assert that they receive about $1 for every 1000 views.

The promise made by TikTok that they wish to be a continuous and reliable source of income for creators is at best absurd. Although we don't claim that every creative using the Creator Fund is receiving inadequate compensation, the data doesn't provide much evidence to support that claim. The pool of artists searching for partnerships may be larger, which may be good news for firms looking to join the influencer bandwagon.

New Instagram Videos Under 15 Minutes Will Automatically Become Reels
Instagram has taken it upon itself to shift every video you submit that is under 15 minutes long (assuming your account is public) into the Reels category as Reels gain popularity.

In the same week that Facebook splits up its main feed and TikTok producers express their discontent with inadequate rewards, new features are being introduced. You can benefit from their new features and possible increased visibility if you're a creator who makes money from Instagram Reels.

Does Reddit Even Have An Ads Policy?
The results of a study by Marketing Brew and Pushshift, an API, revealing which subreddits permitted advertising and which ones didn't, were very puzzling.

The API's analysis of the top 2,500 most popular subreddits produced the results. They demonstrate that, while spending the previous ten years attempting to solve brand-safety concerns, their actual strategy is more circumspect, giving the platform an uncertain and erratic appearance.

By 2023, Reddit's ad spending is anticipated to hit $522 million. To put things in perspective, $5.58 billion is what Twitter is predicted to earn this year. Although they are on the lesser end of the ad platform spectrum, there is still a lot of opportunity for growth.

51% Of Consumers Would Leave A Brand If Digital Experience Isn’t As Good As In-Person
According to PwC's Customer Loyalty Survey 2022, more than half of U.S. consumers (51 percent) said they would be less loyal to a business if the digital experience isn't as good as in-person. That percentage increased to 69 percent for Gen Z.

Businesses are under pressure from the epidemic to create online client experiences that are on par with or better than those offered in-person. Online shoppers are also just a click or touch away from a company's rivals.

Your clients could simply switch to a competitor given how close they are to you on digital platforms. Because switching is so simple, marketers need to be aware of any additional reasons why customers might stop using their products.

Some of this information will be useful to your company, while some will not. This is where we can help you. We can sort through these updates and determine which ones are most significant to you and your company. Contact us for a consultation!