Social Media Industry Round-Up #109: How To Monetise Shorts, LinkedIn Is The New TikTok & The Effect of Social on the US Election

Every week, the team at The Social Shepherd puts together all the relevant industry updates in a round-up newsletter.

This way, we keep our team, clients and interested marketers up to date with what's going on in the social media industry :)

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Extended Ban On Election Ads

Meta extended their ban on electoral ads to a few days after the election results to prevent any confusion or misinformation on election results. The ban was initially supposed to expire at 11.59 pm PT on Election Day. 

Meta is not banning all ads, but new political ads. Meta does not allow ads claiming victory or delegitimising the election; if any advertisers try to publish ads containing this information, they’ll be blocked by Meta’s system.

New ‘Flexible Media’

Meta has launched a new ad option that uses the media uploaded for an ad on additional placements when Meta thinks it’ll improve performance. 

There’s not much information about this new option yet, but we presume it will be AI-powered to resize and optimise creative assets for each placement.

Video Feed 101

LinkedIn is pushing its new TikTok-like video feed, and has now released some tips on creating content that performs: 

• Think vertical & short-form: The sweet spot is between 15 seconds and 2 minutes. 
• Content doesn’t have to be exclusive: Cross-posting from other platforms to LinkedIn is encouraged. 
• Include a strong accompanying post: Provide context to the video, with at least 50 words. 

They also highlighted what type of content works and what doesn’t: 

• YES: Videos that offer standalone knowledge 
• YES: Workplace humour 
• YES: Videos that encourage the viewer to reshare the video with their thoughts 
• NO: Overly promotional content 
• NO: Videos without sound or sufficient of context 
• NO: Videos without post copy

Q5 Planning Guide 

Have you planned ahead of Q5? 

Q5 is the period right after the gifting season that extends through January, and TikTok has referred to it as the ‘underrated post-holiday goldmine’. 

In short, once Christmas is over consumers aren’t done spending, and they likely have gift cards, holiday cash and New Year’s resolutions, so there’s an opportunity for marketers to continue advertising at cheaper rates and against fewer competitors.

These are TikTok’s learnings from last year’s Q5 period: 

• Shopping interest peaks post-holiday: Users look for shopping inspiration and deals post-gifting season. 
• More efficient ad inventory, greater impact: There is less competition for ad space, which equates to more efficient media costs, allowing brands to capture high-intent shoppers. 
• Self-care and treat-yourself mentality: After buying for others during Q4, 69% of users plan to buy products for themselves during Q5. 
• Emerging categories on the rise: Q5 opens up opportunities for brands in unexpected areas like fitness, finance, and gaming, as users plan for the year ahead.

For one of our fashion clients, we saw a 40% drop in CPP (cost per purchase) and a 41% decrease in CPC (cost per click), during this period. 

Also, for one of our beauty brands, we saw a 26.3% increase in impressions, a 54% increase in clicks, a 21.9% CTR increase and a 37.9% decrease in CPC. 

Sharing Music on TikTok 

TikTok has announced a new integration that allows users to share music from Spotify and Apple Music on the platform. 

Tracks will be shared in two ways: 

• TikTok Feed (FYP and Stories): Users will be able to share tracks, albums, playlists and other content using the green screen feature or Photo Mode.
• DMs: Users will be able to send friends their favourite songs, which they can then easily open in the music streaming platform it was shared from.

Increased Boosting 

Instagram has expanded its boosting options so more post types can be easily promoted. 

This new update includes most posts with GIFs, stickers and copyrighted music (you’ll have the option to change it to a boost-eligible one). It’s worth highlighting that they mentioned ‘most’ but not ‘all posts’, so not all might be eligible for boosting. 

This means that marketers will have more freedom in the content they share without worrying if it’s eligible for boosting. 

Monetising Shorts 

Shorts creators will be able to nudge brands to start a conversation on potential partnerships. 

Up until now, only brands could approach Shorts creators but, with this new update, creators themselves (with 4,000+ subscribers) will be able to initiate brand partnerships via linking requests, so the brand is able to see content performance. 

This is a way for YouTube to encourage creators to be proactive and show what they can create for the brands they’d like to work with.