December 2, 2019

The Figaro Digital Digest: November 2019

It’s freezing, the fireworks have been and gone, the knitwear has been worn in and the Christmas hype is increasing by the day – yep, it’s the end of November and 2019 has only one more month yet.

As it’s the time of year for Christmas campaigns and last-minute marketing attempts, the world of social, digital, and marketing media has seen some big changes this month. Find out all the latest developments below.

The Latest Social News

Twitter Introduces ‘Topics’

Twitter rolled out a new feature earlier this month entitled ‘Topics’. The feature allows users to follow topics, much like following user accounts.

Essentially, a user will be able to follow a topic like “sports” or “gaming” and will then see tweets from accounts related to those themes without following the accounts sharing them.

Twitter hopes this will make the platform more enticing to new users, especially those who are more interested in topical discussions as opposed to following personalities.

Instagram Extends Hiding Likes to the US

Instagram is extending its hiding likes change to the United States as the social media giant attempts to “depressurise” the platform.

The feature has already been rolled out in Canada, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Brazil, Australia, and New Zealand. Likes will now completely vanish from Instagram posts, profiles, and feeds.

CEO Adam Mosseri stated that the change is aimed at under-25-year-old users, explaining that “the idea is to depressurize Instagram, [and] make it less of a competition”.

How this will affect influencers and social ads on the platform remain to be seen.

Facebook Introduces New Branding For Its Products and Services

To distinguish its social media platform from its other products and services, Facebook has introduced new branding.

The new brand will be used on products and services Facebook owns such as Instagram and WhatsApp. Users of Facebook-owned products will see the name on the bottom of the log-in screen with colours which reflect the platform.

The Latest Google News

Google Makes Changes to Political Advertisements

Ahead of the UK’s General Election, Google has cracked down on its approach to political advertisements on the search engine.

Google has said it will prevent advertisements from targeting voters based on their current affiliation and viewpoints, as well as being harsher on “demonstrably false claims”.

“We recognise that robust political dialogue is an important part of democracy, and no one can sensibly adjudicate every political claim, counterclaim, and insinuation,” said Scott Spencer, Google’s Vice President of Product Management and Google Ads.

“So we expect that the number of political ads on which we take action will be very limited – but we will continue to do so for clear violations.”

Google to “Name and Shame” Websites Which Load Too Slowly

If you’re not focusing on UX and page load speed, then you should be! Google has now put in place a system to shame websites that load too slowly by displaying a special badge over them within the Chrome browser.

A slow, poorly-developed website is likely to have a series of other traffic and SEO issues, but the addition of a badge or warning will only make matters worse for sites which refuse to catch up with the demands of the modern internet user.

Fast websites, on the other hand, will feature a green progress indicator which, over time, will be associated with good quality websites to the average web user.

So if you’ve been putting page speed and UX off, now is the time to catch up.

The Latest Brand News

Cadbury Utilises Amazon Prime in New Campaign

Amazon has introduced advertising possibilities into its Amazon Prime services, with Cadbury being one of the first big brands utilising the Fire TV device.

The brand has created a film playlist of BuzzFeed’s Tasty series which involve Cadbury products.

“This piece of work demonstrates the value of developing deeper, meaningful relationships that bring stakeholders together through engaging content, in a way that counts,” said Sangeetha Mahadevan, creation director at The Story Lab, one of the agencies behind the idea.

“Collaborating with two trusted brands like Amazon and BuzzFeed really matters when reaching people at home during winter evenings, which is key for Cadbury hot chocolate when it comes to winning that night-in occasion.”

It appears that Amazon Prime may be an advertising hotspot in the future.

Coca-Cola Matching Nostalgia With Technology in Newest Christmas Push

Remember the Coca-Cola truck? Well, the brand is bringing it back with what it calls its biggest festive campaign ever.

In the UK, Coca-Cola will be running its truck featuring ‘Holidays Are Coming’ TV spot with the same sort of images and music as we’re used to, but it will be imbuing this well-known ad with new avenues on digital and social media.

From live-streamed outdoor karaoke takeovers of the Piccadilly Lights to a bespoke Snapchat filter, as well as a usual partnership with navigation app Waze, the brand hopes to mix nostalgia with technology to get an edge this Christmas.

Monzo Becomes the UK’s “Most Recommended” Brand

Monzo has become the most recommended brand by Brits according to YouGov’s Brand Advocacy Rankings.

The banking app scored an 84.8 out of 100, 8 points clear of second place. The brand trust has come about by Monzo’s dedication to word-of-mouth marketing which has seen the company’s value rise to $2 billion.

Despite reported losses of £47.2m, the company may be enjoying the fruits of dedicated word-of-mouth tactics soon.

Our Favourite Campaign of the Month

Aldi Sweeps Festive Awards Yet Again With “Kevin the Carrot”

According to data and consulting company Kantar, Aldi has swept the festive awards once again with its increasingly beloved character Kevin the Carrot.

Following a survey of UK viewers, the ad was nominated as the most powerful and impactful ad. It was also ranked this year’s most different and emotional ad, as well as being amongst the most enjoyable and attention-grabbing.

Aldi has run with the Kevin the Carrot character for the last few Christmas seasons, but the adverts nigh-on evergreen appeal has shown the benefits of keeping things simple. Aldi has complemented its TV spot advert with in-store toys and featuring the character heavily in its Twitter output.

The advert has amassed 3.2 million views on YouTube, too:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T37-A2JdaEk

Overall, the festive season can see a lot of overthinking and overcomplication. Much like the brand itself, Aldi’s Christmas efforts show that simplicity is often the best route.

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