Instagram Launches ‘Instagram Threads’ – Messaging for Close Friends
Another week, another new way for social networks to keep an eye on your every move. 🕵️ Instagram‘s Threads is a private messaging app, living within your Instagram account. A social network within a social network, if you will. It’s designed as an additional private chat space for you and your close friends to share photos, messages and status updates.
Instagram Threads is a standalone app designed with privacy, speed, and your close connections in mind. You can share photos, videos, messages, Stories, and more with your Instagram close friends list. You are in control of who can reach you on Threads, and you can customise the experience around the people who matter most.
Instagram Blog
The thing that is, understandably, causing a few ripples of concern among privacy experts, is the feature called Auto-Status – which automatically shares ‘little bits of context on where you are without giving away your coordinates.’ Only close friends will see your status, and it’s completely opt-in.
According to Karina Newton, Instagram’s Head of Policy: “Threads sends location information to our server to look up locations, it’s not stored there – this information is only stored on your device for a limited time.”
“If you enable Auto Status, Threads will request your location, movement, battery level and network connection from your phone in order to determine what context to share. For example, Auto Status might use your precise location to show your friends that you’re “☕ At a cafe.” Or Auto Status might detect that you’re biking and set your status to “On the Move.” Before this is enabled, you’ll be told what information Auto Status is requesting and will be asked to specifically agree. Auto Status will not share your precise location with your friends, and when Threads sends location information to our server to look up locations, it’s not stored there – this information is only stored on your device for a limited time. It is also deleted if you remove Threads.”
What do you think about this latest release from Instagram? Let us know. 👀
Twitter Releases its October Events Calendar
Twitter releases a helpful monthly calendar to help you plan your social marketing activity for the month – here’s its offering for October.
Events happening around the world this October:
#WorldAnimalDay, October 4
#YomKippur, October 8
#WorldFoodDay, October 16
#InternationalEndPovertyDay, October 17
#Diwali, October 27
#Halloween, October 31
Find the full list here.
LinkedIn Upgrades its Ad Targeting Options
LinkedIn has expanded its audience forecasting tools, providing more specific insight into the industries your ads will reach.
“You can customise the panel to surface specific professional characteristics, like top industries, years of experience, or company sizes for your audience. When combined with contacts you’ve uploaded to Matched Audiences, you can be sure that you’re not only serving ads to the specific prospects you’re trying to reach, but that you’ll have the demographic insights to deliver the content and creative mix that will resonate with them.”
LinkedIn
They have also introduced boolean (and/or) logic:
Find out more from LinkedIn here.
SmarterQueue Launches a Free Social Report Tool
Yup, we decided to use some of our awesome tech to create a completely free social media analytics tool!
Use the tool to:
- Discover your best posting times
- See your most popular posts
- Find your top #hashtags and @mentions
- Track your engagement over time
- Compare content types and number of #hashtags
- Benchmark your success for future comparison
Check it out here.
That’s all for this week, folks!
