We Are Social’s Monday Mashup #602
TikTok said to be launching live shopping in the US
According to a report from the Financial Times, the short video app has been talking with California-based TalkShopLive to provide infrastructure for live shopping features on TikTok. This will allow creators and brands to sell goods through videos on the platform. The company started testing its live shopping product in the UK last year but it didn’t reach their expectations. They are reconsidering new territories where they might see a higher demand, however, it’s worth noting that platforms like Facebook and Amazon have experimented with this in North America and it hasn’t seemed to take off as they hoped for.
Even Twitter is becoming TikTok
The bandwagon is starting to overflow. Twitter has joined in by announcing that they will be utilising the everlasting video scroll by updating their video player to be “immersive.” Tapping on it will make the video full screen, and if you scroll you will start browsing through more engaging video content. This is set to roll out in the iOS Twitter app over the next few days in English first in select countries by iOS and Android users.
LinkedIn rolls out 3 updates to pages
LinkedIn rolled out three pages updates that allow businesses to facilitate more meaningful communication with their audience. Businesses can now create more engaging content with customisable post templates, guide the direction of a conversation with pinned comments, and emphasise their most important values with a new ‘commitments’ section. Companies can include up to five commitments showcasing their most important values for job seekers and potential partners.
Twitch begins testing paid “Elevated Chat” feature
With fees ranging from $5 to $100, you could boost your chat message for a specific time frame – appearing either at the top of the chat or at the bottom of a video. The fees are presented in five different tiers ranging from 30 seconds to two and a half minutes and the messages are queued depending on who purchased it first. The messages will be managed by streamers and moderators, and if a comment is removed for any reason users won’t be able to receive a refund or elevate another message. Twitch began rolling the feature out on Thursday and will continue to be tested for four weeks in select countries: US, Germany, Canada, Australia, Korea, Japan, Brazil, Mexico, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, South Africa, and Taiwan.
Instagram moves to next stage of development with creator ‘media kit’ option
Originally spotted in testing last month, Instagram has now seemingly moved to the next stage of development in its plans for a new in-app media kit creation option for talent: Creator Portfolio. This would guide creators through the process of building their own pitch to brands, with a view to securing more influencer marketing deals. This next stage offers a new welcome screen and an overview of how the process will work, enabling creators to share their profile directly with potential partners in-app. Now, we all know that Instagram’s efforts to get creators more exposure in the app has been proven largely unpopular with its users, so we’ll have to see if this will get things back on track.