Bonded Bitesize – Your Midweek Roundup
Bonded Bitesize – Your Midweek Roundup
Bonded Bitesize – Bringing you your midweek roundup of the latest in digital and media.
Stay connected with recent updates from Microsoft, Google, Meta & many more!
X (formerly Twitter) is offering 50% discounts on ad packages to reignite advertiser interest
Following all the chaos and controversy surrounding Twitter, now X, it’s no surprise that the platform is having to work hard to reassure advertisers of its brand safety. As an additional incentive, Musk and co. is now reportedly pitching 50% discounts to ad partners in the U.S. and the UK for a limited time. Whilst these new discounts are designed to showcase the value of the platform during major events such as the women's world cup, the company did recently reveal that it is in negative cash flow - meaning they will need to raise as much money as they can.
NASA will be launching its own free streaming service, NASA+, later this year
With Netflix, Disney+, AppleTV and Amazon Prime Video just to mention a few - the streaming service market is already incredibly saturated. Despite this, NASA has decided to throw one more into the mix - NASA+, NASA’s on demand streaming service. This ad-free, no-cost streaming service will include live coverage of future launches, documentaries and new and exclusive original series. NASA+ will be available via the NASA app on iOS and Android, and alongside streaming media players such as Roku, AppleTV and FireTV.
Threads sees significant decline in usage, whilst X reports record-high month
Despite its record-breaking launch (achieving over 100 million sign ups in its first few days), Meta’s new app Threads is now suffering a significant decline in usage. According to the Wall Street Journal, Threads has lost roughly 70% of its daily active users since its peak earlier this month. Meta executives, however, have said they were expecting this eventual decline and are not worried as they also anticipate that the new features they are working on will help boost these figures back up.
Pinterest has announced its annual advertiser showcase event, where it will unveil its latest updates & innovations
Pinterest has announced that it will be hosting its annual ‘Pinterest Presents’ advertiser summit this September. The event will showcase the platform's latest updates and innovations presented by a mix of Pinterest executives as well as well known writers and comedians. The showcase is available to stream globally on September 13th, 10am BST - you can register for the event here.
DoubleVerify is expanding its media quality authentication to YouTube Shorts, Masthead & In-Feed Video Formats
DoubleVerify, a leading software platform for digital media measurement, data and analytics, has announced that it is expanding its quality solutions with Google’s Ads Data Hub to enable media measurement of YouTube Shorts, Masthead and In-Feed video formats. This means that advertisers using these formats will now have access to fraud measurement and viewability authentication tools so that they can ensure that their ads are being served to and viewed by real people as opposed to bots.
TikTok partners with post-purchase survey providers to give brands greater insight into customer journeys
TikTok has announced that it is partnering with post-purchase survey providers Knocommerce and Fairing, to help provide ad partners with more data on customer acquisition. The new offering will let brands gather direct insights from TikTok users based on their promotional and customer experience efforts. This data can be integrated into most CRM systems, helping to streamline data collection and analytics. TikTok explains, “Insights from surveys can complement your UTM data and enhance your multi-touch attribution (MTA) and media mix models (MMM) to create a clearer picture of your customers journey”.
Google adds customer support feature on Merchant Centre & warns AI-generated reviews will be treat as spam
Google has launched a new customer support feature on Merchant Centre, to make it easier for shoppers to access support whilst online. This new tool helps businesses display their customer support information directly on the Merchant Centre - improving the user experience and helping to build trust between the user and the business. The company also recently created a new policy on ‘automated content’, that explains that AI-generated reviews will be considered spam.
Shopify has released its Summer ‘23 edition, containing a suite of AI-powered features
Ecommerce giant, Shopify, has released its Summer ‘23 edition that includes a suite of AI-powered features. One of these includes an email capability that can generate subject lines, body copy and send times using AI - helping users save time, and maximise their e-commerce efforts. Shopify also announced a new AI-enabled ecommerce assistant, known as Sidekick, that will soon be available as part of Shopify Magic. Sidekick will help merchants with tasks such as selecting discounts for sales, redesigning store fronts and learning about different features on the platform.
X (formerly twitter) expands Creator Ad Revenue Share program globally
X has announced that its ad revenue share program for creators is now available to all creators across the world. The program enables creators to make money from the ads shown in the replies of their posts. Creators who had already signed up recently received their first big payout, with large creators like MrBeast boasting an impressive sum of $25,801. Whilst the eligibility criteria remains high (with creators needing to meet a minimum of 15 million impressions and have at least 500 followers), expanding the program will make it a much more enticing incentive for creators far and wide.
LinkedIn tests new AI-powered ‘LinkedIn Coach’ to help guide users through the app
LinkedIn has been spotted testing a new AI-powered ‘LinkedIn Coach’ tool designed to help guide users through tasks like applying for jobs, learning new skills and finding new ways to connect to their network. In a screenshot shared by app researcher, Nima Owji, the centralised AI tool suggests questions that it can help answer, including ‘What does Microsoft do?’ and ‘What is the culture of Microsoft?’. While this may help users build their profiles, it also risks making the platform overly saturated with AI-generated content.
Google’s custom report builder adds 33 ecommerce metrics & audiences can now be used with third-party segments in Ads Manager
Google Analytics 4 has added a whopping 33 new dimensions and metrics to its custom report builder to help marketers better understand the performance of their campaigns, as well as create reports from scratch. In addition, GA4 audiences can now be used with third-party segments in Ads Manager, helping to give marketers greater insight into their customer base and campaign engagement performance.
Reddit is rolling out ‘Official’ labels alongside usernames to verify select creators and brands profiles
With all the recent news surrounding X’s and Meta’s paid verification systems, Reddit is the latest platform to announce that it is rolling out its own ‘Official’ labels to verify select users. Unlike other platforms however, Reddit is not charging for its verifications and is only handing them out to select accounts. Reddit explains, “This new label is designed to increase transparency and help Redditors, moderators and communities quickly identify organisations and trust that these users are who they say they are”. These labels could therefore be really useful for brands in building a trusted presence on the app.
Snap’s annual performance report boasts growing user base of 397m users & more active advertisers
Snap has published its performance report for Q2, which shows an overall increase in users as well as ad partners. Firstly, the platform has added an impressive 14 million more daily active users since Q1, taking its daily average to 397 million overall. The majority of this growth comes from the ‘Rest of the World’ category, with countries such as India continuing to see solid uptake. Snap also revealed record active advertisers (up more than 20% YOY) as well as improved advertiser retention. These figures are a positive step for Snapchat’s ad business, as they continue to slowly recover from their earlier struggles.
Microsoft Advertising is rebranding its products & services such as Xandr and PromoteIQ for greater consistency
Microsoft Advertising has begun what it is calling a ‘transformation’ of its products, strategy and services in line with its wider brand identity. Within this rebrand Xandr Monetise will become Microsoft Monetise, and PromoteIQ will turn into Microsoft Retail Media. The company claimed that this would be a gradual change, expanding into artificial intelligence and a variety of services from business networks, ad partners, gaming platforms and browsers.
Google’s PMax testing feature that lets users create product categories, allowing association of products & creative assets
Google is testing a new feature on Performance Max that would allow users to combine products and create collections - enabling businesses to associate creative assets with imagery, videos and text for a better user experience. This ability would help to simplify the product listing process, saving businesses both time and money. Google also claimed that collections can enrich product data, likely resulting in enhanced product performance, increased engagement and a better customer experience.
