Social Media Industry Round-Up #87: Unskippable Instagram Ads, TikTok DM Streaks, AI Tools on YouTube & Text Overlays on Carousels

Every week, the Marketing team at The Social Shepherd puts together all the relevant industry updates in a round-up newsletter sent every Monday morning.

This way, we keep our team, clients and interested marketers up to date with what's going on in the social media industry :)

Don't forget to subscribe if you want to be updated every week.

Unskippable Ads on Instagram, TikTok DM Streaks & Paid vs Organic Social.

Coming up tomorrow at 12 pm BST, our CEO & team will discuss all of the marketing updates of the week, the most important social metrics, and the main differences between organic and paid within an agency… 👀

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Unskippable Video Ads.

Instagram is testing a new video ad format that would keep users from scrolling until they’ve watched the full clip. 

Some users have encountered these ads with a timer at the bottom that does not allow them to continue scrolling until the timer has run out.

This poses the question of whether Instagram will ever look to roll out a premium ad-free version of the app that requires a paid monthly subscription.

We asked our LinkedIn audience if they would pay for an ad-free version of IG, and 93% of the voters said they would not, while 7% said they would be willing to pay. 

Text Overlays.

Instagram has released some beta features to add text overlays on individual images in a carousel, and re-format images in the display.

The three format options will be: 

• Original: Photos are displayed in full size. 
• Portrait: Photos are cropped to portrait/vertical presentation. 
• Square: Photos are cropped down to square format.

New Features for Broadcast Channels.

Broadcast Channels are a way for accounts with over 10k followers to connect with their audiences in a more private way. Instagram has now released some new features: 

• IG Live broadcasts for channel members only: Another incentive for people to sign up to your broadcast chat.
• Custom themes for broadcast channels: Enabling you to add any picture you want as the background for your chat. 
• Emojis: Choose which emojis their community can and can’t react with in the chat.
• QR codes: Connect people back to your channel. 

Money Back Guarantee.

Meta Verified gives subscribers enhanced account support and other features for $14.99/month. Apparently, Meta is generating $150 million per quarter on verified subscriptions. 

The latest update is that Meta is currently advertising a ‘see results within 14 days or get your money back’ for those users who are curious to subscribe but still hesitant about the value for money.

Protection Measures Ahead of the UK Election.

TikTok has announced a new dedicated in-app General Election centre, which will provide reliable and authoritative information for users ahead of the poll.

They've partnered with Logically Facts, a fact-checking partner, to provide media literacy tips alongside key election and voting information from the Electoral Commission.

DM Streaks.

To encourage engagement on TikTok, the platform is testing ‘DM streaks’, which are activated when users maintain daily messaging interaction, the same way as Snapchat streaks work. 

TikTok said: “Unlock a streak by sending messages to each other for three consecutive days. The streak will end if both of you didn’t message each other in the last 24 hours.”

AI Assistance Tools for Creators.

YouTube has revamped its ‘Inspiration’ studio (previously ‘Research’) and added new tools that would give creators AI recommendations for new video ideas.

• Listings of search trends & ‘Breakout’ video clips: “Breakout Videos will highlight videos from similar channels that have performed exceedingly well. The goal is to give creators a more holistic understanding of channels similar to them, what content is resonating with their audience, and inspiration.”
• AI tips element: Entering a topic into the search bar prompts YouTube’s A.I. system to give ideas and notes based on what channel viewers are likely to be interested in.

Expanding Community Posts.

YouTube has expanded Community Posts with all users. These allow channel managers to post text updates that are displayed in the “Community” tab on their channel, as well as in subscriber feeds.