Facebook continues to boost earnings and users in Q2 Facebook has announced another round of excellent results for Q2, with a steady user growth of 3.63%, adding 60 million new monthly users to reach a grand total of 1.71 billion.
Revenue growth was reported at 59% year on year…
Twitter growth limps on (just about) Along with the announcement of Twitter’s Q2 earnings (up 20% from last year), it has shown a very slow user growth. Its 313 million monthly active users are up only 3% from a year ago and just 1% from its last quarter, despite big efforts made in the form of exclusive content deals around sporting events e.g. livestreams of Wimbledon.
Twitter launches new marketing push Twitter has done some research which has shown that one of its main problems is that potential users are unsure of what it’s actually for. Outsiders seem to view it as a social networking platform whereas Twitter believe they are a news platform, so much so that they’ve changed their iTunes and Google Play classification to ‘news’. In the hope of combating stalling user numbers, Twitter are embarking on a marketing push, including the below 45-second spot which hopefully makes things a bit clearer for people.
Twitter adds more sports to its livestream portfolio Hey! Twitter Twitter Twitter. Swing! Twitter Twitter Twitter. Twitter has announced new deals with both Major League Baseball and the National Hockey League. This will mean that they can livestream out-of-market games and additional content which even non-users will be able to access. Exciting news for footy fans as well; they’ve struck a deal with Sky which means they can show Premier League Football clips. A new nightly show called The Rally, which will showcase sports highlights ranging from college events to the Olympics, is also being produced.
What happens to Tumblr and Flickr now Verizon has bought Yahoo? Verizon has now announced that it has bought Yahoo for a reported $4.8 billion after buying AOL last year for around the same amount. People have been wondering what will now happen to Yahoo-owned Flickr and Tumblr. The short answer seems to be, not much in the immediate future. The deal with Verizon doesn’t go through until 2017 and Verizon has said that all the Yahoo brands will still continue to operate separately. With Tumblr, the hope is that a new team will be put in place to enable the platform to make some real money, after it has failed to keep up with newer money-making machines like Instagram and Snapchat. Flickr’s future is more uncertain under Verizon after its failure to innovate quickly enough in terms of mobile adaptation and with less perceived advertising potential than Tumblr. Fans of the photo sharing platform interview by The Guardian said they wouldn’t be surprised to see the service shuttered once the Yahoo deal is official.
Reddit allows brands to sponsor organic user posts In an attempt to become more profitable Reddit has announced it will be working with brands to hand select user posts which they feel fit with their messages and then promote. The example they’ve given is that Taco Bell may want to select a mad Taco Bell fan’s image of a human-sized Crunchwrap Supreme. This will then be displayed on different parts of the site and targeted to users that the brand wants to reach. Users will be asked for permission to use their posts and rewarded with a lifetime subscription to Reddit Gold.
Lowe’s new 360 videos help fans with home improvement Ever wanted to know how to build a teepee in one minute? I know I have. Now you can as part of Lowe’s new content series called Made In A Minute, which shows users how to complete home improvement projects in, you guessed it, just one minute. Users can easily see how each step is done as the videos are made up of eight individual frames stitched together, so users can re-watch each part as much as they like. Take a watch of the video here and start erecting your teepee!
Tiffany buys its first sponsored Snapchat lens Tiffany has made a splash in the sponsored lens world as Kylie Jenner used their first lens in a snap with her little-known sister Kim. The lens features the signature robin’s egg blue and turned Kylie’s eyes into matching blue hearts. Tiffany is the first luxury brand to sponsor a lens, which also draws a white heart with the text “Return to Tiffany Love” when you smile into the camera.
