Facebook launches Bitmoji competitor, Avatars The new feature lets you customise a virtual lookalike of yourself for use as stickers in chat and News Feed comments. Users can customise characteristics such as facial features, hair and clothes. Just like Bitmoji, they convey a range of emotions and common phrases. Avatars is available in Australia now and will be made available to the rest of the world in late 2019 or early 2020.
New Instagram tool allows brands to create ads from influencer content Instagram has released a new update which will give brands and marketers the ability to promote an influencer’s organic branded posts. The new branded content ads will be made available to all advertisers over the coming weeks, with a similar update for Stories to be introduced in the coming months.
Snapchat launches more in-app shopping destinations Building on its current offering which allows some brands, publishers and influencers to add a swipe-up on Snaps for users to buy products directly within the app, Snapchat has introduced a new tool that allows select accounts to have a store within Snapchat. As of last week, only five official accounts were granted access to shops, including Kylie Jenner (Kylie Cosmetics), Kim Kardashian (KKW Beauty), and Spencer Pratt (Pratt Daddy Crystals). But if eyeshadow palettes and moonstones aren’t your thing, Snap plans to release the tool to more official accounts in the coming weeks and will expand the program to publishers later this year.
Twitter simplifies its rules on safety, privacy and more In an effort to make the rules of its platform more understandable, Twitter has simplified the language around its policies from 2,500 to just 600 words – and now describes each rule in 280 characters or less (see what they did there?). As part of the change, Twitter’s policies can now be found under topics of safety, privacy and authenticity. The platform has also added new rules around election integrity, platform manipulation and spam, and has provided step-by-step instructions on how to report violating content. Sadly, Facebook’s T&C’s still span a whopping 14,000 words. Not happy, Zuck!
Top 100 CEOs with the best social media presence Global firm Brunswick Group have conducted a study of over 700 of the world’s top business leaders to determine the most connected CEOs. The research was measured according to digital presence on the leading four platforms: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. The CEO of Walmart, Doug McMillon, took out the top spot, while Mark Zuckerberg lagged behind at #51.
This post has been lovingly prepared by Oliver Ryan, with additional reporting by Ryan Dubras
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