It was a busy week in the digital world. Google announced the retirement of two Google Ads bidding options, and Twitter released a “go live with guests” functionality. As we say goodbye to May and welcome June with open arms, please enjoy this edition of Weekly Reads!
Digital Advertising
Digiday: TikTok’s Ad Load Has Increased, but the Quality Remains Low
TikTok is a hot marketing topic, especially for brands that target 16-24-year-olds. Earlier this year, the talent-focused video app released advertising placement options in the U.S., available through direct purchase. But is it time to start ‘Tok’ing? Right now the brands seeing the most bang for their advertising dollars are national app-focused companies like Poshmark and Grubhub.
Search Engine Land: Google Sunsetting Two Bidding Strategies in June
This week Google announced that they’ll be retiring Target Search Page Location and Target Outranking Share bidding options, starting late June. How will this impact your Google Ads PPC campaign? If outranking a competitor is part of your strategy, you may need to shift your focus to impression-share bidding – specifically bidding for top or absolute top impressions.
Social Media
Marketing Dive: Corn Nuts Is Driving Sales — and Winning Millennials — With ‘out of the Box’ Twitter Marketing
This social media engagement Cinderella story is a great reminder that customers want to be heard. By incorporating organic Twitter tactics like retweeting tagged tweets and responding to messages, Corn Nuts has seen an increase in Twitter follower count, platform engagement and sales.
Social Media Today: Twitter Officially Rolls Out ‘Go Live with Guests’ Option
Last week we highlighted the top 7 video trends for 2019, which included Live Q&A at the top of this list. This week, Twitter announced that live broadcasts can now include multiple people! Through this new platform feature, guests are able to join a user’s live stream through audio-only. This option is perfect for guests on-the-go or people having bad hair days.
The Verge: YouTube’s Trending Section Puts Creators at a Huge Disadvantage Over Big Brands
Ever wondered how a video gets identified as ‘trending’ on YouTube? Using data points from 40,000 videos, a study conducted by a popular YouTube channel, Coffee Break, identified a disparity between individual creator’s content and TV show created content (e.g. a video created by The Tonight Show). An individual creator’s video needed 11 million views before it was eligible for the Trending section vs. a TV show’s video needed around 500,000 views. Individual creators are speaking up, while YouTube’s CEO reminds us that there’s an element of viewers’ safety that’s factored into their Trending algorithm.
Project Highlight
Behind the Bump Podcast: Reaching Mothers Through Straight Talk
Our clients at SCL Health and Stapleton OB-GYN were looking for a unique way to connect in a meaningful way with women who were considering pregnancy or who had recently become pregnant. The goal was to position SCL Health OB-Gyn doctors and labor and delivery nurses as trusted sources for information, while also generating evergreen social media content for the health system and its respective care sites.
