This collection of social media marketing and new hire announcements is a compilation of the past week’s briefs from our daily Marketing Land newsletter. Click here to subscribe and get more news like this delivered to your inbox every morning.

Facebook Shorts: New Page admin tools, update on political ad policies and the Teen Vogue gaffe

A Page Management History feature for admins. Social media consultant Matt Navarra spotted a new Facebook Pages feature called Page Management History that shows all actions taken on a Page, when they were made and who made them. The feature is only visible to people who help manage your Page. Admins can click on the “Settings” tab at the top of the Page and then click “Page Management History” link in the left column. The history goes back to Nov. 1, 2019, and can be downloaded to your business history in Business Manager. 

The latest iteration of Facebook’s political ad policies. Facebook has once again updated its stance on political ads. A new control will allow users to see fewer political and social issue ads in their Facebook and Instagram feeds. From their “Ad Preferences,” users can opt to see fewer ads on topics or interests. Facebook also updated search filters in Ad Library, making it possible to search for ads via exact phrases and adding several new filters to better analyze results (audience size, dates and regions reached). 

Teen Vogue and Facebook’s sponsored content fiasco. In case you missed it, Teen Vogue published a story titled “How Facebook Is Helping Ensure the Integrity of the 2020 Election” without a byline — or a sponsored content label. Criticism flooded in, and Teen Vogue added a “sponsored editorial content” label and byline from a Teen Vogue contributor who said she knew nothing about it. Facebook denied – then acknowledged – it was part of a sponsored package. Teen Vogue eventually removed the piece and issued a statement: “We made a series of errors labeling this piece, and we apologize for any confusion this may have caused. We don’t take our audience’s trust for granted, and ultimately decided that the piece should be taken down entirely to avoid further confusion.” 

Twitter is getting rid of its Audience Insights tab, Facebook reminds API advertisers of Special Ad Category

Twitter says goodbye to Audience Insights. Twitter has confirmed that it will be removing the Audience Insights tab from Twitter Analytics at the end of January. Audience Insights initially launched back in 2015 to give users more in-depth data about their followers, including demographic profiles, purchase behavior insights, mobile device usage stats and more. Now, when users go to view Insights in Twitter Analytics, they will see a notification that the feature is being removed. For now, Twitter has yet to provide further information about a possible tool alternative, though it’s worth noting that Twitter added a new ‘Conversation Insights’ feature to Media Studio in November last year.

Facebook’s gentle ad policies reminder. Last year, Facebook introduced a new policy for U.S.-based advertisers running ads in its “Special Ad Category,” which includes housing, employment or credit opportunities. By February 11, 2020, Facebook will require all U.S. advertisers to identify any active campaigns that belong to a Special Ad Category that were created before Dec. 4, 2019. Advertisers will also need to update targeting settings for such campaigns or the ads will no longer be allowed to run. By March 31, all U.S. businesses creating new ads in the housing, employment, or credit categories must specify the Special Ad Category and update targeting settings to comply with restrictions for Special Ad Category campaigns. All businesses creating ads that do not offer housing, employment, or credit opportunities must indicate “None” in the Special Ad Category field for all campaigns, or the ads will no longer be allowed to run.

Facebook takes action against manipulated media, YouTube issues a policy reminder

Facebook policies on manipulated media. Amid growing concerns around deepfake technology, Facebook is formally taking steps to address and combat manipulated media with a new policy framework. Facebook’s approach has several components, including investigating AI-generated content for deceptive behaviors and teaming up with government and industry partners to expose people behind malicious efforts. Going forward, Facebook will remove misleading manipulated media if it meets the following criteria: Media has been edited or synthesized (beyond adjustments for clarity or quality) in ways that aren’t apparent and could mislead someone into thinking that a subject said words that they did not actually say; or, that the media is driven by AI or machine learning technology that “merges, replaces or superimposes content onto a video” in an attempt to make the final video appear original. 

YouTube’s data collection policy on kids’ content. On Monday, YouTube reminded creators that its new restrictions on data collection on kids’ videos is now coming into effect. The policy was initially announced in September, outlining measures that include removing data targeting from videos identified as being directed at children. In addition to adding a new audience setting in YouTube Studio to help creators indicate whether or not their content is made for kids, YouTube said it will “treat data from anyone watching children’s content on YouTube as coming from a child, regardless of the age of the user.” Essentially, YouTube will limit data collection on children’s content to the bare minimum needed to support “the operation of the service.” YouTube said it will also stop serving personalized ads on videos made for kids and will remove some of the features on kids’ content – such as comments and notifications.

Facebook adds new features to Instant Articles, Twitter rolls out a new research data hub

Facebook Instant Articles. Facebook has rolled out updates to Instant Articles for publishers, including a new recirculation and navigation surface, smarter CTA and ad placements, and support for Facebook Stories. Instant Articles first opened to publishers in 2016 to enable content to load quickly and be monetized within Facebook. The company said Monday Instant Articles have 3x faster load times and 30% more time spent than mobile web articles.

Twitter launches a research hub. Twitter has launched a new hub for academic researchers in an effort to provide more access to information and support around its APIs. The new page, dubbed “Twitter data for academic researchers,” is part of Twitter’s response based on feedback from the research community. The hub includes links to apply for a developer account to access Twitter’s different APIs with additional tools for researchers that cover data integration, analysis and hosting.

Snap buys the AI company it partnered with on Cameos, Facebook launches deepfake challenge

Snap acquires AI factory. Snapchat’s parent company, Snap, has quietly scooped up AI Factory – the computer vision startup that Snapchat collaborated with on its recently launched ‘Cameos’ video mode, according to a new report from TechCrunch. Snap confirmed the news but has not provided further comment on the financial terms, though Snap is believed to have closed the deal for around $166 million. While the details are still fuzzy, it’s likely that AI Factory will have a hand in expanding Snap’s AI investment with more interactive features and creative tools for Snapchat users. Stay tuned, marketers. 

Facebook’s deepfake detection challenge. In mid-December, Facebook launched a Deepfake Detection Challenge (DFDC) – an open initiative aimed at accelerating the development of new technologies for detecting deepfakes and manipulated media. In partnership with leaders in the industry and in academia, Facebook launched the challenge at the Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS), providing entrants with a unique data set of 100,000-plus videos specially created to aid research on deepfakes. The goal of the challenge is to spur researchers around the world to build innovative new technologies that can help detect deepfakes and manipulated media, and results will be scored for effectiveness. Facebook is offering $500,000 as a first-place prize. The challenge is ongoing through March 2020. 

YouTube creators see drop in subscriber count. YouTube has confirmed that beginning around December 25 – 26, some YouTube Studio creators experienced a significant drop in subscribers and view counts, with one creator claiming 50% fewer views than average during the December timeframe. The video platform has since resolved the issue, citing a YouTube Analytics bug. Now, the subscriber count reflected in the YouTube Studio (on snapshot cards, reports, etc) has been corrected. According to YouTube, only the YouTube Studio dashboard was impacted by the issue, while channel pages remained unaffected.

This collection of social media marketing and new hire announcements is a compilation of the past week’s briefs from our daily Marketing Land newsletter. Click here to subscribe and get more news like this delivered to your inbox every morning.

Facebook tests Brand Collabs tool on Instagram creators, Snapchat launches new ad format

Instagram brand collabs. Facebook, Instagram’s parent company, wants to better support collaboration between brands and influencers. The company announced a new test that extends the Brand Collabs tool – which has only been available to Facebook creators – to a select group of Instagram creators. The tool is designed to help businesses connect with relevant influencers for branded content partnerships. Brands can indicate the type of audience they want to work with, including country, gender, age, number of followers, and interests. When brand collaboration campaigns are running, Instagram will provide performance metrics while giving brands the option to promote influencer content in the feed like an ad. 

Snapchat unveils interactive ad format. In partnership with Paramount Pictures for the 2020 release of “Top Gun: Maverick,” Snapchat has launched a new interactive movie preview ad format dubbed the “trailer reaction lens.” These AR lenses allow Snapchat users to participate in the campaign by creating their own content in a split-screen format, capturing both the movie trailer and the user’s reaction. Users can add creative elements to their reaction shots with digital overlays used to promote the film. The move adds Snapchat to the growing list of platforms attempting to encourage real-time interaction from users.

Instagram to cover misinformation with overlay warnings, Facebook launches automated approvals for Groups

Combatting misinformation on Instagram. In an announcement from parent company Facebook this week, Instagram is expanding its fact-checking program globally to allow third-party fact-checking companies around the world to assess misinformation on the platform. Instagram will partner with 45 different fact-checking organizations to rate the truthfulness of photo and video content on the app. Media that’s found to contain misinformation or untruthful content will be hidden from the Explore and hashtag pages, with a warning overlay blocking the content in the feed and Stories until users tap again to see the post. To determine which content should be sent to fact-checkers for review, Instagram will use a combination of platform data and feedback from users. 

Automated approval for Facebook Groups. In an effort to help Facebook group admins better manage new member requests, the social giant has launched a feature that automatically approves new members based on requirements set by Groups admins. Admins are able to turn the feature on in the group settings, allowing anyone who meets all of the membership requirements to automatically be added to the group when they submit a membership request. The automation feature is optional but could be especially useful for businesses that manage a number of large groups with varying levels of membership requirements.

Twitter beefs up safety council, Facebook predicts content trends for 2020

Twitter expands Trust and Safety council. Twitter is making changes to its Trust and Safety Council — an in-house committee Twitter formed in 2016 to help advise on the platform’s products, programs, and policies. According to the company, Twitter is adding more members to the Council to help connect with the perspectives of a broader cross-section of society when establishing platform rules and policies. Going forward, the Council will be made up of several groups, each focused on advising on important issues that contribute to real-world harm. Beginning in 2020, Twitter will initially set up groups focused on: Safety and online harassment, human and digital rights, child sexual exploitation, and suicide prevention and mental health.

Facebook content trends for 2020. The social network has released a new report on the key topics and trends that will inform social predictions for users and marketers going into 2020. Unlike past reports that only analyzed U.S. trends, this year’s report is split into global regions with predictions for each location. The report forecasts trends across a wide range of topic areas, including art and design, beauty and fashion, entertainment, food and drink, mind and body, and travel and leisure. In the North America section, Facebook predicts that a sense of individualism will continue to drive people’s choices with hot-ticket trends like flexitarian diets, indoor gardens, and custom combinations that give people more control over their day-to-day actions.

Facebook braces for privacy laws, #YouTubeIsOverParty calls out platform for censorship 

Facebook counts down to CCPA. With mere weeks to go before the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) takes effect, the social giant last week posted a statement that boiled down to one message: Facebook is ready. “We are ready for its arrival in part because we’ve made many long-term investments across our products to help people everywhere easily manage their privacy and understand their choices,” Facebook wrote. CCPA will be enforced starting January 1, 2020, giving internet users the right to see what data big tech companies collect about them and with whom it is shared. In preparation for the law, the California-based social network has been busy adding new tools to support CCPA compliance, including a new privacy hub that outlines Facebook’s data policies for collection and usage. The company has also added a range of self-serve tools that allow Facebook users to download or delete data.

#YouTubeIsOverParty. Earlier this month, YouTube announced updates to its harassment policy, resulting in a number of creators voicing concerns and frustrations over the stricter new guidelines. Over the last several days, creators and users alike have posted notifications showing content that’s been flagged or entirely removed from the video-sharing platform – a clear indication that the company is moving swiftly to enforce its updated policies. YouTubers have taken to Twitter with #YouTubeIsOverParty in a protest against the new guidelines, which are impeding the monetization efforts of some creators. To make matters worse, many of the videos flagged or removed included explanations that appear unclear and unreasonable, prompting cries of censorship on Twitter.

On the move

Pinterest hires head of monetization engineering, Twitter gets a new director of platform, HubSpot expands its C-suite

Pinterest has announced Waleed Ojeil as the company’s new head of monetization engineering. Waleed joins Pinterest from Google, where he spent 14 years leading teams in analytics, attribution, and measurement products. While at Google, Ojeil also oversaw the unification of web and application analytics. At Pinterest, he will report to the head of engineering, Jeremy King, and run the company’s ads engineering teams.

Greg Lieber, VidMob’s head of partnerships and business development, is joining Twitter as its new director of platform, according to Adweek. At Twitter, Lieber will be responsible for developing strategies that connect the company’s products to the market, as well as identifying strategic opportunities for the social network to grow and evolve its ads ecosystem.

HubSpot has named Yamini Rangan as its first-ever chief customer officer, tasked with uniting the company’s marketing, sales, and services teams. HubSpot says Rangan will be a key member of its executive leadership team, overseeing teams charged with accelerating the company’s business goals. Prior to joining HubSpot, Rangan was chief customer officer for Dropbox and spent time at Workday as its VP of sales strategy and operations.

This collection of social media marketing and new hire announcements is a compilation of the past week’s briefs from our daily Marketing Land newsletter. Click here to subscribe and get more news like this delivered to your inbox every morning.

Facebook braces for privacy laws, #YouTubeIsOverParty accuses YouTube of censorship

Facebook counts down to CCPA. With mere weeks to go before the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) takes effect, the social giant last week posted a statement that boiled down to one message: Facebook is ready. “We are ready for its arrival in part because we’ve made many long-term investments across our products to help people everywhere easily manage their privacy and understand their choices,” Facebook wrote. CCPA will be enforced starting January 1, 2020, giving internet users the right to see what data big tech companies collect about them and with whom it is shared. In preparation for the law, the California-based social network has been busy adding new tools to support CCPA compliance, including a new privacy hub that outlines Facebook’s data policies for collection and usage. The company has also added a range of self-serve tools that allow Facebook users to download or delete data.

#YouTubeIsOverParty. Last week, YouTube announced updates to its harassment policy, resulting in a number of creators voicing concerns and frustrations over the stricter new guidelines. Over the last several days, creators and users alike have posted notifications showing content that’s been flagged or entirely removed from the video-sharing platform – a clear indication that the company is moving swiftly to enforce its updated policies. YouTubers have taken to Twitter with #YouTubeIsOverParty in a protest against the new guidelines, which are impeding the monetization efforts of some creators. To make matters worse, many of the videos flagged or removed included explanations that appear unclear and unreasonable – prompting cries of censorship on Twitter.

Facebook fires contractor over bribes, Instagram tests new Stories layouts

Facebook contractor tied to ad-related bribery. A Facebook contractor was fired after being paid thousands of dollars in bribes to reactivate banned ad accounts, according to a BuzzFeed News investigation. The Facebook contractor in question was allegedly paid to reactivate ad accounts connected to Ads Inc. – a marketing firm based in San Diego (which BuzzFeed News previously found was running a Facebook scam involving ads that made false claims about celebrities). “This behavior is absolutely prohibited under our policies and the individual is no longer working with Facebook,” a Facebook spokesperson wrote in a statement. “We’re continuing to investigate the allegations and will take any further necessary action.” Ads Inc. announced it was shutting down in October as a result of the BuzzFeed News investigation. According to BuzzFeed, the Facebook contractor was based in the company’s Austin office. 

Instagram tests new Stories layout. Instagram may soon rollout new grid layouts for Stories, according to a recent discovery by social media commentator Matt Navarra. Navarra shared a video on his Twitter account showing a new Layout mode, which includes six different grid layouts from which users can insert two, three, four, or six media files. The video also shows options with grids placed vertically and horizontally. The Layout grid was initially spotted in testing by Jane Manchun Wong back in August, which means the feature has likely evolved to the next stage of beta testing.

Snapchat tests new mode, Instagram to verify ages of new users

Snapchat tests ‘Cameo’ mode. The image and video sharing app has started testing ‘Cameo’ – a new mode that lets users insert their faces into GIFs to add their own spin to a range of short clips. With the new mode, users can take a selfie and choose a body type to help Snapchat identify how a user looks. From there, users can use the Bitmoji button in the Snapchat messaging keyboard to access Cameo GIFs that include the user’s face. According to TechCrunch, which first announced the news this week, Snap said it plans to launch the new feature on December 18th with a global rollout on iOS and Android.

Instagram begins verifying age for new users. Almost a decade after its launch, Instagram will finally start asking new users to provide their age in an attempt to better protect younger users. The new requirement started earlier this week, with the photo-sharing app prompting new users for their date of birth when an account is created. Up until now, Instagram users simply had to confirm that they were older than 13 when signing up, but weren’t required to provide a birthday. Instagram said it would use age information to recommend younger people opt for more privacy settings, such as allowing new message requests only from people they follow.

ON THE MOVE

C-suite transitions at the Academy of Country Music, Schwan’s Co., Google and JP Morgan

The Academy of Country Music (ACM) has promoted its CMO, Damon Whiteside, to CEO. After serving in the CMO role for six years now, he will take over as the organization’s lead on January 6, splitting his time between Los Angeles and Nashville. “His experience, commitment and enthusiasm in the Country Music world are well documented and we are confident that he will enhance the Academy’s ability to bring together fans, artists and the industry,” said Ed Warm, chairman of the board for the ACM. During his tenure as CMO, Whiteside is credited with overseeing the development of ACM’s multimillion-dollar marketing and media campaigns and building strategic partnerships with media partners, digital companies and Fortune 500 brands. 

Schwan’s Co., a food services business, has named Robert Rios chief marketing officer. He will serve as Schwan’s first-ever CMO and be part of the company’s executive leadership committee. “As the food industry continues to rapidly change, we are particularly excited about the role Roberto will play in accelerating our company’s digital transformation, building on the strength of our brands, catching trends and meeting evolving consumer preferences and customer needs,” said CEO Dimitrios Smyrnios. With more than 25 years’ experience in the consumer goods industry, Rios most recently served as the CMO for beverages at PepsiCo’s world headquarters, overseeing the company’s Pepsi, Mountain Dew, Gatorade, 7UP and LifeWater brands. 

PayPal’s former COO Bill Ready is moving to Google at the start of the year as the new head of commerce, reports TechCrunch. Ready will report directly to Google’s SVP of Ads, Commerce and Payments Prabhakar Raghavan and focus on bringing Google’s “vision, strategy and delivery” to its commerce products. “Bill’s exceptional track record building great experiences for consumers and deeply strategic partnerships makes him a powerful addition to our team. I couldn’t be more excited for the future of commerce at Google,” said Raghavan in a statement shared with TechCrunch. Ready was the founder of the tech startup of Braintree which was acquired by PayPal in 2013. He has been part of PayPal’s leadership team since the acquisition.  

JP Morgan’s CMO Kristin Lemkau is transitioning to a new role within the company, serving as the head of the U.S. wealth management division, according to The Drum. The wealth management division is a new business unit launched by JP Morgan, reports the Wall Street Journal, catering to clients with up to $25 million in assets. There has been no official announcement about who will take over the role of CMO for JP Morgan per The Drum’s coverage. Lemkau, who started with JP Morgan within its PR department, was named CMO in 2014. Earlier this year, Ad Club of New York named Lemkau marketer of the year.

Bezos adds 6 more execs to his S-team, Foursquare and Episerver get new CEOs

Jeff Bezos has added six new members to Amazon’s senior executive team, including two women – bringing the total number of women on the team to three. Known as the “S-team,” the elite, 22-member group is made up of senior-most leaders who head various divisions of the company with direct communication to Bezos. The newest additions have all been promoted from within the company, including Christine Beauchamp as Amazon Fashion Vice President, and Colleen Aubrey as Amazon Advertising Vice President. The new faces of the S-team also include Rohit Prasad, Alexa Vice President; Neil Lindsey, Amazon Prime chief; and Peter Krawiec, Corporate Development Vice President, who was a central figure in the company’s 2017 acquisition of Whole Foods.

Location-based platform Foursquare has promoted David Shim to the role of CEO and added his name to the board of directors. Shim, who joined the location-based technology platform Foursquare as president in June, was previously the founder and CEO of Placed, which provides ad-to-store attribution services for brands. Foursquare’s current CEO, Jeff Glueck, will be leaving Foursquare at the end of the year to explore new opportunities, reports Adweek.

Episerver, a digital experience platform, has named Alex Atzberger as its new CEO. With more than 15 years of experience at SAP, most recently as president of SAP Customer Experience, Atzberger was chosen after the company’s board interviewed many highly qualified candidates, according to Episerver’s Executive Chairman Adam Berger, who recently served as the company’s interim CEO. “When we dreamed up the perfect candidate it was him. Alex is entirely additive to this all-star Episerver team who welcomes his leadership to hit our customer-centricity strategy out of the park for the betterment of our customers, their respective customers and our partners,” said Berger. Episerver announced last month its acquisition of the content intelligence and analytics platform Idio.

This collection of social media marketing and new hire announcements is a compilation of the past week’s briefs from our daily Marketing Land newsletter. Click here to subscribe and get more news like this delivered to your inbox every morning.

Facebook’s anti-ad-fraud efforts, Twitter expands surveys

Facebook takes action against ad fraud. The social media giant filed a lawsuit Wednesday against one entity and two individuals for allegedly operating a hacking campaign targeting accounts on the social network. The alleged hackers are being accused of taking over their victims’ accounts to use their money to buy ads and fraudulent products, according to the lawsuit. Facebook said it’s paid more than $4 million in reimbursements to victims of these hacks. The company said it will continue to work toward mitigating malicious behavior on the platform, adding, “Creating real-world consequences for those who deceive users and engage in cloaking schemes is important in maintaining the integrity of our platform.”

Twitter expands access to Brand Surveys. In a play to give marketers more ways to measure campaign lift, Twitter announced this week the general availability of Brand Surveys for all managed accounts in the U.S., UK, Canada, Japan and Brazil. According to Twitter, the tool can be used to help inform and improve campaigns with the added benefit of being a first-party solution, which Twitter says allows the platform to offer “a low minimum media spend requirement while still delivering statistically significant results.”

Facebook now enforces restrictions for special ad categories on all platforms

This week, Facebook announced it will be officially enforcing audience targeting restrictions for ‘Special Ad Categories’ across all of its ad management tools, including Ads Manager, Instagram Promote, the Facebook Marketing API, and ads created within Facebook Pages.

The special ad category requirement is used for ads related to housing, employment, or credit opportunities, prohibiting these advertisers from targeting ads based on age, gender, ZIP code or multicultural affinity. The effort is a move on Facebook’s part to curb discrimination by advertisers. The ‘Special Ads Category’ was first introduced earlier this year for U.S. advertisers running housing, employment, and credit ad campaigns via Facebook’s Ads Manager. Starting this week, Facebook is expanding the requirements to all of its ad buying platforms, including Ads Manager app, Instagram Promote and the Facebook Marketing API.

Facebook said it’s also making these ads available to view and search in the platform’s Ad Archive – an effort to deliver further transparency. Users will be able to view all active housing opportunity ads in the U.S. that started running on or after December 4, 2019, regardless of whether the user is part of the target audience. Users will also be able to search the Ad Archive by the name of the Page running an ad, or by the city or state where the ad is targeted. 

Facebook’s efforts to remove ad targeting options for housing, employment and credit advertisers are the result of a settlement the company reached with civil rights groups earlier this year, which charged Facebook with allowing discriminatory ads on its platform. Facebook first began rolling out the restrictions in March.

TikTok admits to taking the “wrong approach” to combat cyberbullying

TikTok faces discrimination backlash. The popular video-sharing app has admitted to censoring posts from users it identified as disabled, fat or LGBTQ as part of a misguided effort to mitigate cyberbullying. The revelation was made public by Netzpolitik.org, which spoke to a source inside the company and obtained private documents from the platform. The findings revealed that TikTok applied automatic restrictions to users who were “susceptible to bullying or harassment based on their physical or mental condition,” including, “facial disfigurement, autism, Down syndrome, or disabled people or people with some facial problems.” In a follow-up statement, TikTok said, “Early on, in response to an increase in bullying on the app, we implemented a blunt and temporary policy. While the intention was good, the approach was wrong and we have long since changed the earlier policy in favor of more nuanced anti-bullying policies and in-app protections.” According to Netzpolitik.org, the rules were implemented as recently as September of this year.

Twitter rolls out a privacy hub. Twitter launched the Twitter Privacy Center – a centralized resource that advertisers and users can use to quickly and easily access the platform’s rules and policies – as well as personal data settings and privacy tools. The new site will contain information about Twitter’s initiatives, announcements, and privacy products, in addition to status updates on security-related incidents. “It should be easier to find and learn more about the work we’re doing to keep your data secure, including what data we collect, how we use it, and the controls you have,” the company wrote in a blog post.

Chrome extension shows Instagram Likes, Facebook tests “Favorites,” Snapchat couples up with Verizon

Return of the Like? Instagram is still testing hiding Likes – but a new Chrome extension from SocialInsider wants to give users the ability to view them again. Once added to your Chrome browser, the extension displays the number of likes and comments for any post on Instagram. The installation terms state that user data is not shared with Socialinsider servers.

Facebook tests a feature similar to ‘Close Friends.’ Rumor has it the social network is experimenting with a new option that allows users to share their Facebook and Messenger Stories with a “Favorite” group of friends – rather than sharing with everyone. The feature bears a striking resemblance to Instagram’s ‘Close Friends’ feature, which adds a layer of privacy and speed for users who choose to share content with only a select group. 

Snapchat to be preloaded on some Verizon phones. Last week, Verizon and Snap announced a partnership that involves Verizon preloading the Snapchat app onto some of its 5G phones as part of a campaign promoting the 5G network. Snap will give Verizon ad placement in its Snap Originals programming, and it will also work with Verizon’s 5G Labs to build augmented reality experiences for live events and Verizon marketing activations. As Snapchat makes efforts to ramp up its AR capabilities (with plans to eventually roll out a wearable component), Verizon’s 5G speeds coupled with Snapchat’s audience reach could make the brand’s AR aspirations a reality. Get ready, advertisers.

This collection of social media marketing and new hire announcements is a compilation of the past week’s briefs from our daily Marketing Land newsletter. Click here to subscribe and get more news like this delivered to your inbox every morning.

LinkedIn cracks down on bad accounts and spam. Last week, LinkedIn released its latest Transparency Report, which addresses its efforts to remove spam and fake accounts, along with actions taken based on user reports and government information requests. According to the report, LinkedIn took down more than 21 million fake accounts in the first half of the year, and removed more than 60 million pieces of spam – including fake job postings. It also got rid of more than 16,000 instances of harassment, 11,000 posts containing obscene or pornographic content, nearly 2,000 posts showing violence or terrorism and 22 occurrences of child exploitation.

YouTube to creators: It’s OK to take a break. YouTubeYouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki posted a year-end letter addressing the ongoing challenges of creator burnout and a new push to level the playing field between creators and advertisers. Wojcicki said company data indicates that creators can still maintain growth even if they take a break from creating. The comments follow a year mired in creator frustrations around platform updates and content infringements. Wojcicki explained that the platform wants to make it easier for creators and advertisers to work together on content that works well for both partners. “We’re working to identify advertisers who are interested in edgier content, like a marketer looking to promote an R-rated movie, so we can match them with creators whose content fits their ads. In its first month, this program resulted in hundreds of thousands of dollars in ads on yellow icon videos,” she said.

Facebook Dating joins the family. Facebook Dating, a feature of the main Facebook app, now allows users to add Facebook and Instagram Stories to their Facebook Dating profiles. The short-lived Stories format could give Facebook Dating a leg up in the dating app game by allowing users to showcase ephemeral content that tells a natural story about their day-to-day lifestyle and interests.

Real-time service status monitor. Facebook now has a status monitor that advertisers and social media managers can check to find out if an ad platform is experiencing outages or issues. The simplistically-designed status monitor provides the status of the Facebook Ads Manager platform as well as the service status of tools such as ad creation and editing, ad delivery, and ad reporting. Andrew Foxwell tweeted a link to the status page yesterday, adding that the page has been an ongoing request to Facebook by digital teams. 

Simplifying Lookalike audiences. Facebook is testing the removal of the location field that advertisers use to create Lookalike audiences –  Facebook’s tool for reaching new audiences based on how they compare to existing customers. In the test, Lookalike audiences use locations from ad sets – eliminating one extra step in the targeting setup process

YouTube adds Nielsen data to Reach Planner. In a move to beef up the way advertisers optimize TV and online video while maximizing reach, YouTube is bringing Nielsen TV data to its Reach Planner tool. With Nielsen TV data in Reach Planner, advertisers are able to optimize their mix of TV and online video to maximize reach, balance frequency, and reduce waste. Advertisers can also change the mix of YouTube formats to better understand the effect on the overall campaign.

Facebook under fire for political ads policy. The social media giant has been facing heavy criticism in recent weeks over its political ads policy, which fails to fact-check political claims and enables the spread of potentially deceptive propaganda. On Monday, one of Facebook’s top executives – Carolyn Everson, VP of global marketing solutions – again defended the policy, stating the company has no plans to change it and insisted voters should decide what messages resonate as true. Facebook’s unregulated political ad climate raises questions about the platform’s standards for determining news integrity, and could further strain the relationship between advertisers and audiences as the political landscape heats up in the coming months. 

‘Whale’ lets users create and share memes. Facebook’s New Product Experimentation (NPE) team has launched a new meme creating app dubbed Whale. The app, which is currently being tested in Canada, allows users to upload images from a stock library and then add various effects before sharing the meme on social media or sending it as a message. Whale joins a long list of experimental apps that have either been launched or acquired by Facebook, including Moments, Notify, Lifestage, Poke, Slingshot, Tbh, Moves and Hello.

TikTok hits 1.5 billion downloads. The video creation and sharing app has exceeded 1.5 billion downloads worldwide, according to the latest data from Sensor Tower. The figure makes TikTok the third most downloaded non-gaming app of the year, behind WhatsApp (with 707.4 million installs) and Messenger (with 636.2 million). It ranks just above Facebook, which claims 587 million downloads, and Instagram, with 376.2 million.

Twitter makes it easier to report abusive Lists. Fresh off of banning political ads, Twitter is making it easier for users to report Lists that are being used for abusive purposes. Lists – a Twitter feature that enables users to follow groups – has garnered some criticism over the years for enabling harassment. Twitter will now allow users to flag Lists as abusive, the company announced Monday, marking the first time Twitter has offered a reporting function specifically for lists.

On the move

Wrapify, TBWAMedia Arts Lab, Searchmetrics get new execs

Douglas Cardova has been named the new VP of business development of OOH advertising platform Wrapify. Based in New York, Cardova will be tasked with expanding Wrapify’s presence across the U.S. and building brand awareness and recognition with clients and agencies in the OOH space. Much of his focus will be dedicated to Wrapify’s East Coast presence, while also supporting all business development aspects across the U.S. With an extensive background in the OOH space over the last decade, Doug was previously at EnPlay Media, where he was responsible for developing the go-to-market strategy for new business and sales growth.

TBWAMedia Arts Lab, the global creative agency owned and used by Apple Inc., yesterday announced the appointment of Marianne Stefanowicz as the agency’s first chief communications officer. With two decades of experience, Stefanowicz will be responsible for all internal and external communications, with an emphasis on global integration across the agency’s seven offices. She will report directly to the agency’s global president, Katrien De Bauw, in the Los Angeles headquarters. Stefanowicz joins TBWAMedia Arts Lab after a four-year tenure at Droga5 where she was the chief communications officer, responsible for driving the agency’s reputation and managing all agency communications.

Search and content optimization platform Searchmetrics has appointed Matt Colebourne as its global CEO. Colebourne has held numerous senior leadership positions across the digital marketing arena, including roles at DoubleClick, eSpotting and Trinity Mirror. At Searchmetrics, Colebourne will be tasked with driving international growth for the company in the U.S., Germany, UK, and Croatia. Before Searchmetrics, Colebourne was the European VP International for DoubleClick, part of the team responsible for growing the business prior to its sale to Google. 

This collection of social media marketing and new hire announcements is a compilation of the past week’s briefs from our daily Marketing Land newsletter. Click here to subscribe and get more news like this delivered to your inbox every morning.

Facebook confirms Groups data breach caused by API bug. The company said that private Groups member information – such as names and profile pictures – might have been accessed by approximately 100 partner developers from video streaming and social media management apps. According to Facebook, developers that may have accessed group members’ information after the Groups API restrictions were announced in April 2018 will be asked to delete member data that might have been retained. There has been no evidence of abuse discovered so far, Facebook said.

Expanding Messenger encryption, despite warnings. On Wednesday, Reuters reported that Facebook plans to expand encryption across its Messenger platform, despite warnings from regulators and government officials that the enhanced security will help protect pedophiles and other criminals. The plans were announced at the Web Summit tech conference in Lisbon earlier this week. Executives told Reuters they plan to detail safety measures, including stepped-up advisories for recipients of unwanted content. The changes have gained the support of civil rights groups and technology experts globally.

LinkedIn adds new language translation settings. In an effort to make LinkedIn more accessible and personalized for international users, the platform has introduced two new settings. The settings allow users to input all the languages they understand but do not want to be offered translations for, as well as the ability to define which language users would like all content translated into. This makes the choice of content experience explicit, and also extends the translation offering beyond the LinkedIn interface languages to the 60 offered for translation by Microsoft Cognitive Services.

Facebook urged to ban political ads ahead of UK election. In an open letter published on Monday, Mozilla, political pundits, and campaigners demanded that the social media giant stop running political ads until Dec. 12. Referencing Facebook’s current ad policies, the letter states: “We are aware that these policies are subject to debate both inside and outside the company. While that debate continues, people in the UK are left in uncertainty about whether they can trust what they see on the platform.” The petition follows Twitter’s recent move to ban political ads, with Twitter’s CEO confirming that the company plans to share more on the final policy by November 15, and will begin enforcing its ban on political ads November 22.

Indicators

Our ad tech trends roundup of 2019 shows that digital ad spend in the U.S. remains dominated by the Google and Facebook duopoly. Amazon, at 7% share, is the only seller to break out from the pack of would-be challengers. Amazon this year released a number of improvements to its ad-buying interfaces, such as improving the usability of its DSP, extending the reach of Sponsored Products, adding a rewards program tool, incorporating customer acquisition metrics and enabling dynamic bidding for Sponsored Products ads.

However, even as Amazon continues to build up its advertising product, as well as the new mobile, over-the-top (OTT) and connected TV ad inventory entering the space in the coming year, the Facebook/Google duopoly will likely continue to dominate into 2020.

On the Move

Ad platform Criteo has named Megan Clarken CEO. The company is splitting the roles of CEO and chairman, adding Clarken to lead the organization, while Criteo’s founder and former CEO JB Rudelle will continue as chairman of the company’s board of directors. “I am personally very happy to work with Megan on the next phase of our transformative journey. The addition of Megan will significantly strengthen our executive team in its strategic evolution,” said Rudelle. Clarken comes to Criteo after fifteen years with Nielsen. Most recently she served as the chief commercial officer for Nielsen Global Media.    

Michael Londgren has been named chief marketing officer for Seismic, a SaaS sales enablement platform. He will oversee the company’s international and vertical growth and be tasked with growing its position within the industry. “Michael has a strong history establishing companies as market leaders within their respective categories,” said Seismic CEO Doug Winter. The CEO went on to say he was confident that Londgren would help the company deepen its market leadership. Prior to joining Seismic, Londgren held marketing leadership roles at Google Cloud, DocuSign, Adobe and BoardVantage. 

The video technology company KERV Interactive has expanded its C-suite with the promotion of  Marika Roque to chief operating officer and Taylor Pate to chief technology officer. The two will work together to plan, develop and implement the company’s technology roadmap — including its SaaS platform strategies, building on current product features, KERV’s social and YouTube offerings, as well as on-boarding publishers to its system. “We are thrilled to promote them to our C-Suite, and we are confident their leadership will help us continue to grow and reach new milestones,“ said KERV CEO Gary Mittman. While Roque will be focused on managing client-facing needs and operational elements, Page will oversee the technology roadmap and functionality.

The Big Picture

Build trust in your audience with these key email marketing considerations

Gaining permission from a recipient sets the stage for building trust. This includes both the trust of the recipient and the trust of their ISP, which ultimately controls which emails are delivered, which go into the spam folder and which are blocked entirely.

READ MORE >>

This collection of social media marketing and new hire announcements is a compilation of the past week’s briefs from our daily Marketing Land newsletter. Click here to subscribe and get more news like this delivered to your inbox every morning.

Twitter reports an uptick in data requests. Between January and June of 2019, Twitter received 7,300 demands for user data, with the majority of requests coming from U.S. government agencies (2,120 demands for 4,150 accounts), reports TechCrunch. Requests for data was up 6% compared to the same time period last year, according to the company’s latest transparency report. “Twitter said it removed 124,339 accounts for impersonation, and 115,861 accounts for promoting terrorism, a decline of 30% on the previous reporting period,” writes TechCruch. Twitter has also added impersonation data and insight to the report, offering up numbers on actions taken against accounts posing as another person, brand or organization. During the first half of the year, Twitter said it took action against 124,339 accounts for violating its impersonation policy.

No more political ads on Twitter. If you missed Wednesday’s news, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey announced on Twitter, minutes before Facebook’s earnings call, the company will stop allowing political ads on the platform. “While internet advertising is incredibly powerful and very effective for commercial advertisers, that power brings significant risks to politics, where it can be used to influence votes to affect the lives of millions,” tweeted Dorsey. The CEO said the company plans to share more on the final policy by November 15 and begin enforcing its ban on political ads November 22. The timing of Dorsey’s tweet — right before Facebook’s earnings call — was arguably an indirect dig at Facebook in light of its stance not to fact-check ads from politicians. Facebook argues its policy is about free speech, and that political ads will account for only 0.5% of its total revenue next year. 

Facebook files lawsuit against OnlineNIC. Facebook is suing OnlineNIC and its privacy/proxy service ID Shield for registering fraudulent domain names, such as www-facebook-login.com and facebook-mails.com that were created to look as if they were connected to Facebook. “By mentioning our apps and services in the domain names, OnlineNIC and ID Shield intended to make them appear legitimate and confuse people,” writes Facebook Director of Platform Enforcement and Litigation Jessica Romero, “We don’t want people to be deceived, so we track and take action against suspicious and misleading domains, including those registered using privacy/proxy services that allow owners to hide their identity.” Facebook said there millions of such fraudulent domains, and that it actively reports such abuse to domain name registrars. But, in some instances, domain name registrars and privacy/proxy services fail to take down the domains. “This was the case with OnlineNIC and ID Shield, and that’s why we’ve taken this action to stop this type of domain name abuse,” writes Romero.

Sprout Social files to go public. The social media management platform Sprout Social has filed for its IPO, reports Crunchbase. Founded in 2010, the company currently has 23,000 customers in 100 countries per its S-1 filing, with the lion’s share of its revenue coming from software subscriptions. “The company estimates that the market opportunity for its product is $13 billion in the United States. And since about 30 percent of its revenue came from customers in other countries in 2018, Sprout believes the international opportunity is, at least, as large,” writes Crunchbase. Sprout Social revenue in 2018 was $78.8 million, up from $44.8 million the previous year.

Hootsuite and Proofpoint deliver compliance tool. Hootsuite and Proofpoint, a security and compliance company, have partnered to offer a real-time compliance verification feature for composing and publishing social media content via the Hootsuite composer platform. “This feature will put up the guardrails, and give our customers in regulated industries the confidence to empower their people to capitalize on the power of social media to achieve their business objectives, particularly around social selling,” said Hootsuite SVP of Product and Technology Ryan Donovan. The tool will be integrated into Hootsuite’s composer platform so that social media posts will be automatically screened — alerting Hootsuite users to common compliance policy violations as they type. Users will not be able to publish a social post until the violation is corrected.

Buffer adds scheduling feature for Instagram Stories. Earlier this month, the social media management tool Buffer rolled out a new feature that allows users to plan their Instagram Stories in advance, with the option to storyboard their posts, create draft captions, and schedule a reminder for posting for the Story. “We spent months talking to consumer brands that are using Stories as a key channel for their marketing, and found that there was a common theme; they were spending too much time navigating between tools to prepare their Stories, and scrambling to keep up with their audience’s appetite for regular content,” said Buffer Product Marketer Mike Eckstein. The feature is available on Buffer’s web application, as well as its iOS and Android apps. 

Facebook aims to keep users healthy. Facebook has rolled out a new Preventive Health Tool designed to connect users with health resources and check-up reminders. “To help you keep track of your checkups, we collect information you provide, such as when you set reminders or mark a screening as done. We also log more general activity, like frequency of clicks for a specific button, which allows us to understand how the tool is being used, in order to improve it over time,” wrote Facebook on its Newsroom Blog. Users will be able to set appointment reminders, schedule health tests and find affordable care using the Preventive Health tool. The company says recommendations for checkups offered by the tool are based on a user’s sex and age per their Facebook profile. At first glance, it looks like a helpful resource, but it’s worth noting just how much information you’re giving a platform that has never been all that good about keeping user data safe.

Employees want Facebook to change its ad policies. In response to Facebook’s policy of not fact-checking ads from politicians, a group of 250 Facebook employees signed a letter asking the company’s leaders to rethink how it handles political advertising, reports the New York Times. The employees said the policy is a “threat to what FB stands for” and that they “Strongly object to this policy as it stands.” The letter, which was posted on Facebook’s internal Workplace platform, was shared with the New York Times by three employees who asked not to be named. Facebook spokesperson Bertie Thomson told the New York Times, “Facebook’s culture is built on openness, so we appreciate our employees voicing their thoughts on this important topic. We remain committed to not censoring political speech, and will continue exploring additional steps we can take to bring increased transparency to political ads.”

Twitter confirms certain users will see more ads. Twitter has confirmed that users with high follower counts may be seeing more ads in their timeline. The company sent the following statement to Marketing Land when asked about the uptick in ads for certain users: “Historically, people with high follower counts have seen fewer ads. Recently, we’ve taken a more consistent approach of showing ads to everyone who uses Twitter and as a result, people with higher follower counts will notice an increase in the number of ads they’re seeing.” When asked what it deems a “high follower count,” Twitter would not divulge any numbers.

On the Move

Michael Scheiner has been named chief marketing officer for the Tommy Hilfiger. The retail brand says Scheiner will be tasked with bringing the company into a “new era of innovative marketing strategies” across digital and experiential platforms, aiming to reach the next generation of shoppers. Tommy Hilfiger CEO Daniel Grieder said he believes Scheiner will help fuel the company’s ongoing digital transformation. “I am excited to work closely with Tommy, Daniel and the company’s talented marketing teams around the world to write the next chapter,” said Scheiner. Before joining the company, Scheiner was the SVP of global marketing for Hollister Co.

Nationwide has promoted Ramon Jones to chief marketing officer. He has been with the insurance company for nearly 20 years and will be replacing Terrance Williams who announced he will be leaving the company in November. Jones will report to Nationwide CEO Kirt Walker and will oversee brand and marketing strategy, creative services, social media and corporate communications. “During his nearly two decades at Nationwide, he has held numerous leadership roles in the business and in marketing that make him uniquely qualified to promote and protect the Nationwide brand and position him to drive further business success,” said Walker about Jones’ appointment to CMO. Jones most recently served as Nationwide’s financial services marketing leader.

Beyond Meat has recruited Stuart Kronauge to serve as its chief marketing officer. The producer of plant-based burgers is bringing on Kronauge to help advance product sales in retail stores and build partnerships with more restaurants open to vegan offerings. Kronauge comes to Beyond Meat from Coca-Cola where she was employed for more than 20 years. Kronauge is credited with the resurgence of Coca-Cola’s Coke Zero, Diet Coke, Sprite and Fanta product lines during her time at the company. She will officially join Beyond Meat in January, 2020. 

Jeff Herzog has been appointed chairman and CEO of the digital marketing agency ZD3. “I am excited to be back in the industry as the CEO of ZD3 and grateful to my team and clients that continue to support our innovation and drive forward into rapidly expanding and changing digital landscape,” said Herzog. Prior to being named CEO, Herzog founded ZOG Digital in 2011. That agency was acquired by Inventis Digital in 2017. He is also the founder and former CEO of iCrossing before it was purchased in 2010 by Hearst Magazine.

Toronto-based agency SDI Marketing has named Tom Sorotschynski vice president. He will be tasked with driving the agency forward and report to Senior Vice President Kim Harland. “His passion for emerging technologies and understanding of the ever-evolving digital landscape allows him to create programs that are all-encompassing and truly connect consumers to brands,” said Harland. Sorotschynski most recently served as the vice president and general manager for Traffik & 5Crowd agencies owned by Sgsco, a global collective of brand agencies.

BrandStar, a full-service production and marketing agency, has hired Bradley Saveth to fill the newly created VP of strategic partnerships role. “Saveth joins BrandStar with a wealth of relationships, experience, and expertise to match clients with strategic opportunities and expand the agency’s global footprint,” said BrandStar CEO Mark Alfieri. Before joining BrandStar, Saveth launched two startups: goCharge and Vital Motion. He most recently was the president of Big Salad Consulting. During his career, Saveth has worked with a number of consumer brands, including Verizon, Wells Fargo, Wendy’s and more.

This collection of social media marketing and new hire announcements is a compilation of the past week’s briefs from our daily Marketing Land newsletter. Click here to subscribe and get more news like this delivered to your inbox every morning.

Facebook makes space for news. Facebook has confirmed to Marketing Land it will not be placing ads in its newly introduced News tab, but publishers will still be able to monetize their content as usual with Instant Articles and other options.

The Washington Post first reported Facebook would be launching a news tab on the platform. Sources told the paper that the news stories featured in the tab will include articles from hundreds of news organizations, some of which will receive payment from Facebook for their content.

“Facebook’s service will include some human curation by a small editorial team of journalists, who will select top stories. But mostly the News tab will rely on computerized algorithms that seek to match user interests with offerings from a wide range of reports on politics, sports, health, technology, entertainment and other subjects,” reports the Washington Post. 

The Washington Post listed itself among the approximately 200 news organizations that will be included in the launch.

Other publications named by sources include the Wall Street Journal (which is owned by News Corp.), Business Insider, BuzzFeed News and local news publications. Sources told the Washington Post that the New York Times was also likely to participate, but terms had not been finalized. According to the report, payments by Facebook to news organizations will range from “hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars.”

New look for LinkedIn’s Daily Rundown. LinkedIn has redesigned its Daily Rundown, the platform where the site curates news stories selected by an internal team of editors. The redesign includes new navigation that makes it easier for users to move between stories and go deeper into specific topics. By clicking on a headline within the Daily Rundown, users will be able to see conversations happening on the platform about the story. The site has also started a pilot program allowing users to subscribe to regularly published pieces by industry thought leaders. LinkedIn mentioned two available newsletters: the “Get Hired” newsletter and one called “The Hustle” — both offering insights into the job hunt and professional goals. Users who have access to the pilot program can find more newsletters by clicking the “Newsletters Related to Your Industry” option under the “My Network” tab.

TikTok touts its safety measures. The short-form video app TikTok, which boasts more than 500 million users, has released a second set of videos that are part of its “You’re in Control” video series, highlighting the platform’s safety and privacy features. “Educating our users on the options we provide to help them craft their optimal TikTok experience is one of our top priorities,” writes TikTok on its newsroom blog. The company has enlisted 12 of its most popular creators to produce videos on six different topics, including how to block a user, how to filter comments, reporting inappropriate behavior and how to disable or enable the duet feature which allows two videos to be posted side-by-side in the same screen. 

Majority of political tweets come from only 10% of users. After analyzing a random sample of tweets from U.S. adults with public accounts, Pew Research found the majority of political tweets are made by a very small segment of users. According to their findings: 97% of tweets mentioning national politics came from only 10% of users. Those who are tweeting about politics are also more likely to follow others who feel the same way they do. “Political tweeters – defined as those who tweeted at least five times in total, and at least twice about national politics, over the year of the study period – are almost twice as likely as other Twitter users to say the people they follow on Twitter have political beliefs similar to their own,” writes Pew Research.

Facebook’s latest efforts to safeguard elections

Facebook is doing some crisis control this week after receiving much criticism for how it handles political content and advertising on the platform — allowing candidates to run ads containing false information. The company announced a number of new updates to its Ad Library, launched the Facebook Protect program and made Pages more transparent. None of these updates reverse the company’s decision that, as the Washington Post put it: “Opens a frightening new world for political communication — and for national politics.” 

Here’s a rundown of the company’s recent moves to keep its platform safe during elections:

Updates to Ad Library offer more insight into political ads. Facebook’s Ad Library, the platform that archives all ads run on the platform during the past seven years, will now include a feature that tracks spending by U.S. presidential candidates. Facebook is also adding spend details for candidate campaigns at the state and regional level, and clarification around where the ad ran: Facebook, Instagram, Messenger or Facebook’s Audience Network. Starting next month, Facebook said it will begin testing a new database that allows researchers to download the entire ad library and pull daily snapshots to track day-to-day changes.

Facebook Protect: A program to keep political accounts safe. Launched this week, Facebook Protect is designed to secure Facebook and Instagram accounts belonging to candidates, elected officials, federal and state departments and agencies, and party committees in the U.S. Participants must enroll to be part of the program, and once accepted, will receive advanced security protections and monitoring for potential hacking threats.

“If we discover an attack against one enrolled individual, we can review and protect other accounts that are enrolled in our program and affiliated with that same campaign,” writes Facebook on the Facebook Protect website, “Additionally, all Page admins of enrolled Pages will be required to go through Page Publishing Authorization to ensure the security of the Page, regardless of whether or not individual Page admins choose to enroll in this program.”

To enroll, Page owners must already have received the blue-verified badge. Once a Page has been verified it can enroll via the form listed at the bottom of the Facebook Protect site.

More transparency for political Pages. Facebook is adding an “Organizations that Manage This Page” tab to Pages to clarify what organizations are behind political Pages on the platform. The tab will list the organization’s legal name and verified city, phone number or website. For now, this information will only be included for Pages with large U.S. audiences that have already completed Facebook’s business verification process and any Pages that have been authorized to run ads about social issues, elections or politics in the U.S.

“If we find a Page is concealing its ownership in order to mislead people, we will require it to successfully complete the verification process and show more information in order for the Page to stay up,” writes Facebook executives Guy Rosen, Nathaniel Gleicher and Rob Leathern on the company’s Newsroom Blog.

On the Move

Rob Goldman, Facebook’s VP of ads, announced on Twitter that Tuesday was his last day at the company: “Some personal news: After more than 7 years, today is my last day at Facebook. What I will miss most are the people, who are among the smartest and most talented I’ve ever met. I wish them all the very best in their important work.” wrote Goldman. He first joined Facebook in 2012, and was named director of product ads and Pages in 2014.

Twitch, the Amazon-owned game streaming site, has named Doug Scott as its new chief marketing officer. He is replacing Kate Jhaveri, Twitch’s former CMO who left the company earlier this year. “Doug has deep experience extending brands into new markets across games and entertainment industries, making him the ideal fit to lead Twitch’s marketing strategy,” said Twitch COO Sara Clemens. Prior to joining Twitch, Scott led marketing for the social gaming platform Zynga and was CMO for the music startup BandPage. 

Hyundai Motors has hired Angela Zepeda as its next chief marketing officer. Zepeda will oversee all U.S. marketing and advertising efforts for the automaker, including strategic direction, brand development, national and regional advertising, experiential and social marketing, lead gen and more. “Angela was already a member of our extended family and we’ve seen firsthand her creativity, business acumen and talent in building our brand and leading teams,” said Hyundai COO Brian Smith. Prior to joining the company, Zepeda was the senior vice president and managing director of INNOCEAN USA, Hyundai’s agency of record.

Heidi Bullock has been named chief marketing officer for Tealium, a customer data orchestration platform. CEO Jeff Lunsford called Bullock a fantastic addition to the team. “Heidi will undoubtedly help us expand our market position in a high growth market and continue to solidify us as a global leader in the industry,” said Lunsford. Prior to joining Tealium, Bullock most recently served as the CMO for Engagio. She also held the role of group vice president of global marketing at Marketo.

The marketing performance management platform Allocadia has hired Julia Stead as the new chief marketing officer and added John Stetic to its Board of Directors. Stead will focus on working with Allocadia clients, guiding marketing leaders in developing strategy, investing intelligently and optimizing their marketing investment results. “I’m thrilled to be joining a team that is focused on helping other marketers achieve the same growth I’m passionate about driving for my own company,” said Stead. Before joining Allocadia, Stead was the VP of marketing at Invoca. Stetic, a veteran in the martech product industry, currently serves as the senior VP of innovation and partnerships at ServiceMax.

BitPay, a global blockchain payments provider, has appointed Bill Zielke as the company’s first chief marketing officer. In his new role, Zielke will be tasked with executing marketing strategy that supports BitPay’s growth objectives, building a strong business and consumer brand, and cultivating an increased awareness around cryptocurrency and its use. “We realized we needed a seasoned marketer to advance the company to the next level. We are excited to have Bill on board as we attract more users to BitPay and drive greater merchant acceptance of cryptocurrencies,” said CEO Stephen Pair. Zielke’s former marketing leadership roles include time at Ingo Money and Forter, serving as CMO at both venture-backed startups.

This collection of social media marketing and new hire announcements is a compilation of the past week’s briefs from our daily Marketing Land newsletter. Click here to subscribe and get more news like this delivered to your inbox every morning.

Event planning on LinkedIn. LinkedIn has rolled out a new Events feature that makes it easy to create and share event announcements. The feature can be found in the “Community” panel on the  left side of the newsfeed, and allows users to enter their event description, date, time, venue and invite connections using filters such as location, company, industry and school. “You’ll be able to seamlessly create and join professional events, invite your connections, manage your event, have conversations with other attendees, and stay in touch online after the event ends,” writes Ajay Datta, LinkedIn India’s head of product. Once an event is posted, users can track attendees, post updates and interact with the users they have invited. Users who have accepted an event invite on the platform will be able to see their events under the “My Network” tab. 

Twitter defends its policies for world leaders. Twitter is defending its policies for allowing content from world leaders that may otherwise be prohibited. After listing enforcement scenarios for why it may remove a Tweet from a political figure, such as “promotion of terrorism” and “Clear and direct threats of violence against an individual,” the company goes on to say, “We will err on the side of leaving the content up if there is a clear public interest in doing so.” The company said it understands why users want clear yes/no decisions regarding what’s allowed, but that it’s not that simple: “Our mission is to provide a forum that enables people to be informed and to engage their leaders directly.” 

Reddit pushes back against lawmakers. On Wednesday, executives from Reddit, Google and the Electronic Frontier Foundation took questions from Congress about possible modifications to the 1996 Communications Decency Act currently being considered by lawmakers, specifically Section 230 of the law which gives social media platforms immunity from being held responsible for content posted by users. “Lawmakers from both major political parties have said Congress could make additional changes to the law to restrict companies’ immunity,” reports Reuters. Reddit CEO Steve Huffman published his comments to Congress on Reddit’s Upvoted blog, explaining why Section 230 is critical to the company: “Reddit uses a different model of content moderation from our peers — one that empowers communities — and this model relies on Section 230. I’m here because even small changes to the law will have outsized consequences for our business, our communities, and what little competition remains in our industry.” 

An easier way to create Story Ads. Facebook is launching customizable templates for Story ads that can be used across Facebook, Instagram and Messenger. The templates allow advertisers to choose from a variety of layouts once they have uploaded their creative assets to Ads Manager, and come with editing tools to select background color, text and cropping options. “We’re making it easier for businesses of any size to create for fullscreen vertical stories placements,” writes Facebook on its business blog. Streetbees reported a 40% increase in incremental app installs and a 29% reduction in cost per incremental app click when using the new templates.

Instagram launches new data-security features. Instagram is giving users more control over their data with a new feature that allows them to remove third-party apps connected to their account. Under the account “Settings” page in the app, users will be able to click on “Security” to find the “Apps and Websites” option. From there, users can remove any third-party apps to keep them from accessing their data. The social media platform is also launching an authorization screen that will list all the information a third-party app is requesting to access. Users will have the option to cancel access to their data directly from the authorization screen. Unfortunately, it may take some time before all users have access to the new features — Instagram reports they will be rolling out over the next six months.

Reddit opens up its content to Snapchat. Reddit announced a new Snapchat integration, making it easy for users who have Snapchat downloaded on their mobile device to share Reddit posts on the app. “Simply tap the ‘share’ icon on an image, text or link-based post on Reddit’s iOS app and select the Snapchat option. Then choose a few friends to send the post to, or add it to your Story,” writes Reddit on its Upvoted Blog. Once posted to Snapchat, the content will include a sticker with the Reddit logo and source information. This is the first content-sharing integration for Reddit. Sharable content is limited to posts from “Safe for Work” communities and communities in good standing on the platform. At launch, the feature is only available on iOS, but will be rolling out on Android devices soon.

More bad news for Facebook Libra. Things are not looking good for Facebook’s Libra cryptocurrency project. Last week, PayPal announced it was pulling its participation in the network, and now eBay, Stripe, Visa and Mastercard are following suit. According to Gizmodo, the only two remaining payment platform partners are Mercado Pago and PayU. Visa said it would continue to evaluate the project and that its ultimate decision would based on the Libra Association’s ability to meet regulatory expectations.

“Visa’s continued interest in Libra stems from our belief that well-regulated blockchain-based networks could extend the value of secure digital payments to a greater number of people and places, particularly in emerging and developing markets,” a Visa spokesperson told CNBC. When Facebook initially launched the Libra Association, it had 28 companies that had agreed to be part of the group. That number is now at 22 — with each member agreeing to pay a $10 million fee to be part of the association and have voting rights. The Libra Association is scheduled to meet next week in Geneva to review the charter and appoint board members, reports CNBC.

Pinterest Lite. Pinterest is taking efforts to make sure its platform is available to users in emerging markets. The company launched its Pinterest Lite app last week, offering users an app that downloads faster and takes up less space on their mobile device. This is the second go at offering a Lite version of the app — according to TechCrunch, a Pinterest Lite app was pulled from Google Play last year. The latest Lite app is the result of a project that Pinterest started in July of 2017 when it formed a team tasked with rewriting its mobile web app from scratch as a progressive web app, reports TechCrunch. The new app is designed to offer a better user experience for people in low-bandwidth environments on limited data plans.

Facebook holiday preparations. Facebook is rolling out new Story Ad templates across Facebook, Instagram and Messenger in time for holiday promotions. “We know businesses have limited resources and time, and it may not always be possible to create new assets for ad campaigns. So we’re making it easier for businesses of all sizes to create vertical, full-screen assets,” writes Facebook on its News Blog. For Messenger, the company is rolling out instant replies in the coming weeks so that businesses can automatically respond to customer communications and create saved replies for commonly asked questions. It is also making it possible to set up an “away message” in Messenger for when a business is closed. 

New Twitter app for Mac users. After sunsetting its Mac desktop client last year, Twitter has launched a new Twitter app for Macs, but it is only available on the latest version of macOS Catalina. Twitter reported in June its plans to take advantage of Apple’s Mac Catalyst, a toolset that allows developers to bring iPad apps to the Mac desktop, reports TechCrunch. “Twitter had been one of the more highly anticipated Catalyst apps,” writes TechCrunch, citing that many users were left to rely on third-party apps, like TweetDeck or paid applications like Twitterific 5 or Tweetbot 3, when Twitter stopped offering its Mac desktop app. According to TechCrunch, the new app is free and the interface is consistent with the rest of Twitter’s platform apps, but the timeline doesn’t refresh in real-time. 

On the Move

The Minneapolis-based TV ad agency Marketing Architects has hired Marin Suska as its new VP of client growth. Suska was the agency’s former director of media services and is now returning after serving in various marketing roles at multiple agencies, including Haworth Marketing Media, The Nerdery and Digital River. “Marketing Architects is a different agency than the one I knew working on the media team years ago,” said Suska, “The strategic nature of how this agency does business with clients, the colossal shift from radio to TV, and the greater goals lying ahead all played a role in my interest in returning to be a part of something big.”

Richard Nicoll has been named chief commerce officer and managing director at Liquid Omnicommerce, a Dubai-based retail consultancy. In his new role, Nicoll will be responsible for driving regional growth and enhancing the agency’s offerings. “He is the real pioneer of shopper marketing in the UAE,” said Liquid Omnicommerce Founder Sachinnn Laala, “With a wealth of experience in highly competitive global markets, the insights he will bring will benefit our clients tremendously.” Before joining Liquid Commerce, Nicoll served as the chief shopper marketing officer for Publicis Communications in Asia. Marketsmith Inc., a woman-owned marketing agency in New Jersey has added three new hires to its executive team this month.

Jo Maggiore has joined the agency as Creative Director, Samantha Foy has been named senior director of digital media and Rachel Schulties is the new VP of client performance. “We have brought in strong, accomplished women who each bring something unique to us, but all embrace data, analytics and modeling,” said Marketsmith President Rob Bochicchio, “More importantly, these leaders have made their mark with great clients and bring that expertise to Marketsmith to take outcomes for our client partners to a whole new level.” Before joining the agency, Maggiore was the director of digital creative at GNC. Foy previously worked at Active International and Schulties was in managed services at Digital Media Solution.

This collection of social media marketing and new hire announcements is a compilation of the past week’s briefs from our daily Marketing Land newsletter. Click here to subscribe and get more news like this delivered to your inbox every morning.

Facebook gives businesses new Messenger tools. Facebook has rolled out two new features for businesses on Messenger and is testing a new dynamic persistent menu and composer. The latest updates include the ability to send images, template quick replies within messages sent in response to a post or comment on their Facebook Page. It has also added app link support for URL buttons shared via a message. “Now when people click URL buttons with the App Link metadata, it will enable developers and businesses to provide a button that will directly open the target native app,” writes Facebook on its Developer Blog. The beta test for the dynamic persistent menu and composer is designed to make it easier for businesses to personalize conversations on the user level. Developers can sign up to be part of the closed beta here: User Level Menu Beta for Messenger. 

LinkedIn renames Groups. LinkedIn sent an email to Group Admins to notify them that, in the next few weeks, it would be updating the names for Group types and introducing a separate permission process for inviting new members. Soon Groups will either be “Listed” or “Unlisted” — listed groups will be included in search results on the platform and visible on members’ profiles; unlisted groups will not be included in search and won’t show on members’ profiles (but can be shared using the group’s URL). Also, Group invitation settings will now, by default, allow members to invite their 1st–degree connections. This setting can be disabled so that only Admins have permission to send Group invites. All requests to join a group still have to be approved by an Admin.

Instagram gets creative. Instagram is launching a new “Create” mode in Stories that, according to TechCrunch, will initially highlight an On This Day feature. The feature surfaces previous posts by users that they can share in a Story as an embedded post. “This new mode helps you combine interactive stickers, drawings and text without needing a photo or video to share,” an Instagram spokesperson told TechCrunch, “On This Day suggests memories and lets you share them via Direct and Stories.” The On This Day feature includes a dice button that lets users click to view different On This Day posts. Instagram has made the feature easily accessible to users, placing it as part of the new Create Mode that lives inside the Stories composer. To find the Create Mode, swipe right at the bottom of the screen from the Stories camera.

Bad video metrics cost Facebook $40 million. Facebook has agreed to pay $40 million in a settlement with the ad agencies that accused the company of miscalculating video metrics. According to The Hollywood Reporter, most of the payment will go to the agencies that purchased video ads, but $12 million of the settlement has been earmarked for the plaintiffs’ attorneys. Facebook was charged with, not only miscalculating metrics, but knowingly inflating video ad metrics by as much as 150% to 900%, per the complaint filed by the plaintiffs. Facebook agreed to the settlement, but still claims the case is “without merit.” The plaintiffs said, had they gone to trial, they could have received as much as $100 to $200 million in damages, according to the report.

Instagram says goodbye to the Follower Tab. Instagram is disabling its Follower Tab, a feature that allowed users to view likes comments and follows from their connections on the app. The heart tab, where users could view their friend’s activity, will display only the user’s own activity now, according to BuzzFeed News. “People didn’t always know that their activity is surfacing,” Instagram Head of Product Vishal Shah told BuzzFeed, “So you have a case where it’s not serving the use case you built it for, but it’s also causing people to be surprised when their activity is showing up.” Shah said simplicity was the driving factor for removing the tab since it wasn’t a feature many were using — or even knew existed. 

“Emails from Instagram” helps identify phishing attacks. To help prevent phishing scams, Instagram has launched a new feature that lets users check if an email they received was a legitimate email sent by Facebook or Instagram — or if it was part of a phishing attack. The new “Emails from Instagram” feature is contained within the app’s Security settings and lists every email sent by Facebook or Instagram during the last two weeks. “If you see an email in there then you can be sure it’s legitimate, and you can safely click any links it contains,” reports The Verge, “If it’s not, then it could be a phishing scam, whereby someone impersonates a service to trick you into giving them your username and password.”

Facebook launches app to compete with Snapchat. Threads from Instagram is the company’s new standalone, camera-first messaging app. Similar to Snapchat, users will be able to send text and videos with augmented reality filters to their friends. Unlike Snapchat, though, the app only allows you to communicate with your Close Friends — the private list of VIPs that you designate within the main Instagram app. 

Additional information such as a location description, battery level and statuses is where Threads diverges from Instagram’s built-in direct messages. This information can be shared to give your Close Friends an idea of your availability to interact with them. Precise locations are not shown — for example, “At the gym” may display as a status but without the gym’s name or address — and the app does not include a map. Currently, Instagram has no plans to show ads or monetize Threads directly, nor will Facebook use location data for targeting, TechCrunch reported.

Facebook plans to challenge global content takedown ruling. “It undermines the long-standing principle that one country does not have the right to impose its laws on speech on another country,” Facebook said in a statement to TechCrunch, regarding the European Court of Justice’s ruling that it must remove content on a worldwide scale if any of the national courts of its 28 member nations determines that the content is illegal or defamatory.

Facebook currently complies with requests to take down illegal content, but reserves the right to leave it up for global users so long as it obeys the platform’s Community Standards.

Google in talks to acquire TikTok rival. Conversations are being held between Firework, a Redwood City-based company and app used to share short videos with other users, and Google. The app tries to surface viral videos for its users, separating itself from the industry leader by emphasizing an older audience. In a fundraising round held earlier this year, the company was valued north of $100 million and, although the Wall Street Journal reported that pricing has yet to be discussed, the acquisition is expected to cost Google more than that. This potential deal is something to keep an eye on as Google’s dominant position has garnered more regulatory pressure and raised issues of anti-competitive practices at home as well as abroad.

Indicators

Gartner CMO Spend Survey: Social wins biggest chunk of digital ad dollars

In its latest CMO Spend Survey, Gartner asked more than 400 marketers how their company’s 2019 digital ad budgets would be allocated. Social won the biggest piece of pie, getting 23.7% of digital ad budgets, followed by display ads and video ads. “Overall, CMOs maintain a positive outlook for digital ads, with 78% of CMOs confident that they’ll increase investments in 2020,” reports Gartner.

Based on the survey findings, nearly a quarter (22%) of marketing budgets are going to agencies. While this is still a significant portion of marketing investments, that number has steadily dropped during the last two years: 25% of marketing budgets were allocated to agencies in 2017 and 23% last year. Gartner reports marketing budgets in North America and the UK have shrunk since 2018, dropping from 11.2% to 10.5% this year.

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On the Move

Brinker International has promoted Ellie Doty to senior vice president and CMO of Chili’s Grill & Bar restaurant chain. In her new role, Doty will lead U.S. and international brand marketing for Chili’s, managing everything from menu innovation to advertising, media and public relations efforts. “Ellie’s innovative leadership has helped the Chili’s brand achieve positive results in fiscal 2019 and I am confident she will continue to drive success for the business,” said Brinker CEO Wyman Roberts. Doty joined Chili’s in 2017 as the restaurant’s VP of marketing. Before coming to Chili’s, Doty held leadership roles at Yum! Brands, working with Taco Bell and KFC.

Denise Karkos has been named CMO for SiriusXM. She will report to SiriusXM President of Sales, Marketing and Operations Jennifer Witz and oversee brand and digital marketing for both SiriusXM and Pandora brands. “She and her team will execute a cohesive marketing strategy to drive brand relevance and consideration through to customer conversion, with a deep focus on digital, social and mobile marketing,” said Witz. Prior to joining SiriusXM, Karkos served as Ameritrade’s CMO and was named the 2019 CMO of the Year by Ad Age.

Traeger Grills has named Todd Smith as its new CMO. The industry veteran will be focused on brand building and storytelling to help elevate the company as a lifestyle brand and further expand its community. “We’re most excited to bring in Todd for his dedication to culture and leadership,” said Traeger Grills CEO Jeremy Andrus, “Todd’s ability to build and lead great teams to do innovative things will help strengthen what it means to be part of Traeger Nation.” Before joining Traeger Grills, Smith was CMO for EXOS and has held various marketing roles at The Coca-Cola Company.