Trending Stories
Stanley Cups survive all
TikToker @danimarielettering’s video went viral after she salvaged her Stanley drinking cup from her burnt-out car. The cup was all in one piece and even still had ice in it! The video showcased the resilience of her Stanley drinking cup. The TikTok community rallied, suggesting Stanley replace her car.
Stanley’s president, Terence Reilly, responded to the overwhelming support and expressed gratitude in a TikTok video stitch. He praised the video as a testament to their product’s quality. The brand listened to the voice of the TikTok community. Stanley announced they would replace Danielle’s car. Overwhelmed by the unexpected gesture, Danielle shared her disbelief in a follow-up video, expressing gratitude to the TikTok community for the idea. The power of social listening pulls through once more.
@danimarielettering Thirsty after you catch on fire? @Stanley 1913 is like no problem i gotchu #fyp #carfire #accident #stanleycup ♬ original sound – Danielle
Spotify Wrapped 2023 is here and brands are loving it
It’s that time of year – Spotify Wrapped is officially live! Towards the end of each year, the music streaming platform wraps up users’ top artists, songs, albums, and genres. What has become an annual tradition for Spotify users has now been updated with new insights, including “Sound Town”. It matches you to a city based on your listening. “Me in 2023”, assigns you to one of 12 character cards reflecting your listening traits. If you’ve reached the top percentile of listeners for specific artists, you may even receive a personal message from artists like Taylor Swift, Bad Bunny, NewJeans, and Jung Kook. Spotify’s AI DJ can even lead you through your statistics and comment on your top categories.
Brands were quick to jump on this trend, including Jack in the Box, Time Out London and Hubspot. It’s a perfect trend for brands to hop on and showcase their creativity. Have you checked yours out yet?
A little birdy turned into a big X and called out advertisers
Onstage at the DealBook conference, Musk decided to double down on the current tensions between X and advertisers. He launched into a tirade when asked by Andrew Ross Sorkin about current pauses in advertising following Elon’s endorsement of an antisemitic conspiracy theory on X. His sentiments that advertisers boycotting would be responsible for the death of X seemed more of a threat than a plea. It will likely add further weight to the scale of those considering pulling their spending from the platform.
It’s been far from a smooth transition, with increasing worries over the approach to moderation on X. Brands are less comfortable with having their messaging alongside content that may go against their target audiences’ values. Regardless of where one stands, being told to go f**k yourself is usually seen as a conclusive summary of Musk’s approach to running X.
Platform Updates
TikTok adds new UI to guide algorithm preferences
TikTok is the latest platform to integrate conversation UI elements into their system. The use of UI will help grow the ‘For You’ page settings, with a new ‘Customize Feed’ option that enables users to add preferences of what they would like to see more or less of on their feed. A screenshot shared by a Threads user shows the new customization tool – a simple text field where users can add a preference, like “I’d like to see more posts from creators I follow”. Other features include choosing how long you’d like to see certain content for. This makes it easier for users to see the exact content they want without relying simply on in-app triggers and algorithms.
The additional feature is sure to improve user experience within the app. It will drive more engagement with users being able to explore content they’re interested in. It may also be a necessary update that all similar platforms should make. Especially for meta-owned platforms such as Facebook and Instagram. They receive regular complaints about not having chronological timelines or seeing too many reels from accounts they don’t follow. With several growing platforms acknowledging UI as ‘the future’, it is a waiting game to see who implements this feature next.
Instagram introduces new tools for your Reels
This week Meta announced its latest update around reel and story creation.
The first update they are introducing is English text-to-speech voices as well as new font and filters for your content. The other update Meta is unveiling is Meta’s GIF “Clip Hub” which allows users to add clips with audio to their reels.
Meta is not only helping you improve your content creation. It’s now also rolling out new insight features for reels, including ‘reels plays’. It allows you to see how many initial plays and replays your content gets. The other way they are improving their insights is by working on their audience retention graph so users can see when their audience begins to lose interest.
YouTube experiments with new Generative AI chatbot
YouTube has started incorporating AI into its video streaming services. The two new features include AI-generated topic summaries and chatbots viewers can talk to as they watch videos. Creators can now have a better view and control of their comments section. They can categorize comments by topic and engage more with conversations in the comments section. With the AI chatbot, viewers can ask questions about videos, and even be quizzed on educational videos.
These two features are part of Google’s broader effort to incorporate AI into its services. It includes search, Gmail, and its office productivity suite. YouTube will also be experimenting with using AI to generate video summaries next year. The platform hasn’t announced when these tools will be made publicly available. But YouTube Premium members can expect first access.
That’s a wrap on This Month in Social! For weekly updates on the latest trends and stories, follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
