November Social Media Updates

We’re another month down (and another month closer to Christmas, if you’re a festive fan like me) so let’s take a look at how social media has changed in the penultimate month of the year. 

It’s been *arguably* quite a quiet month in the world of social media. Facebook hasn’t really dealt with any more fines or data breach issues since their massive $40 million settlement in October (well done?), and we haven’t really seen any mind-blowing new features added. But, if you like to keep up on any and every development, here’s our summary.

Logo Change for the Facebook Family

Without a doubt the biggest update in social in November was the unveiling of their new collection of logos for the whole family of apps. It isn’t particularly revolutionary, but the new all caps logo will be used on Instagram and Whatsapp too, with the colours of the text matching the respective brand colours. By changing Instagram and Whatsapp to be noticeably ‘by Facebook’, they are cementing their position even more as the leaders of social media. 

Inappropriate Content and Fake Profile Cull 

Facebook, Inc. has taken a newly vested interest in the wellbeing of users and launched its latest Community Standards Enforcement Report in November. The stats are pretty impressive, in particular the percentage of drugs and firearms related content removals in Q3. It’s nice to see Facebook being more transparent with their figures and showing the audience that it really is working to improve the platforms’ content. 

Facebook Launches New Teen App 

Social Media Today  reported this month on the development of a new teen focused app coming from Facebook. The app is a new meme creating platform called Whale, currently available in Canada, planned to rival TikTok and Snapchat.  Facebook hasn’t released anything officially about this move, but it will be interesting to keep an eye on and see how it goes. 

Instagram Donate Button

Instagram has made it easier to donate to charities with its new sticker feature. The new ‘donate’ button allows viewers to make donations at the click of a button. A positive update to the much loved feature. Let’s see how charities and companies use this moving forward.

Twitter Tests Tweet Scheduling

Twitter has begun testing its own tweet scheduling feature, built into the tweet composer, leaving out the need for TweetDeck and other third party scheduling tools. As a social media marketer, this won’t make that much difference, as third party management tools offer greater insight, analytics tools and cross platform posting. However, it is still a good step and will be extremely useful for small business owners.