With the first semester and Q2 of the year coming to an end, it is a great idea to review the latest digital marketing updates from June. We hope these new features and news can support you in adjusting your digital strategies to kick-off to a great start in the second semester of the year.
Are you ready to see what’s been happening in the digital marketing industry? Let’s begin!
Search Marketing Updates
Source: Google
Starting in March, Chrome started making changes that could improve the navigation of users. They had been working on identifying potentially malicious websites and phishing attacks to enhance safety.
With the purpose of further elevating the browsing experience, Chrome has rolled out a ML model affecting the web push interaction requests. So, what is this all about?
Currently, the subscription to push notifications works under a permission-prompt basis, which might interrupt browsing navigation, based on the time and trigger set on this prompt. Chrome has recognized this risk and taken action to lower the risk of downgrading user experience.
The new update aims for seamless navigation and will use machine learning properties to display the permission prompt appearance. The algorithm will be based on previous behaviours and patterns of users to determine preferences for denying and silencing undesired permission prompts. Based on these patterns on each Chrome user, new push notification subscription requests will be blocked or shown to be granted permission by the user.
Google has announced on their blog that we can expect this feature in their next Google Chrome release, with an ML model that would make these predictions fully on-device.
Google Ad Manager / Prima91
New updates and tweaks are coming to Google Ads Manager. Some of them are exciting, such as the integration with Google Analytics 4 (GA4) and optimised pricing.
Details and changes were listed in their Q2 releases notes, and we have gathered 5 of their most relevant updates here:
- Optimised Pricing:
This update will help to reflect and protect the value of inventories by increasing action floor prices. This option comes enabled by default, but can be easily disabled via network settings. - Google Analytics 4 Integration in its beta version: The integration of GA4 and Google Ad Manager is now open for web data. This means that any website that decides to pursue this change will make the best out of the analytics tool. To enable this integration, you just need to follow the steps Google provides to link your Ad Manager account to the Google Analytics 4 properties.
- Video Experience Protection: The opt-in “Allow video ads” has been enabled under a block called “Block non-instream video ads”
- Bid rejection: More clarity was added to the “Bid rejection reason” in both reporting and data transfer.
WebView API for Ads: This feature is now ready and will help app developers to unlock the monetisation opportunity in the WebView content.
It seems as if this year will be an exciting one for Google Ad Manager, given that the company has also revealed it will be introducing new features in the near future.
A help documentation guide has revealed that Google’s web crawler only optimises the first 15 MB of the HTML of a page to determine rankings. This means that anything after this cut-off won’t influence the rankings calculations.
This confirmation certainly left a feeling of uncertainty within the SEO community. However, Google also specified in their documentation their position regarding heavier components such as images and videos. Specifically, they stated:
“Any resources referenced in the HTML such as images, videos, CSS and JavaScript are fetched separately.
After the first 15 MB of the file, Googlebot stops crawling and only considers the first 15 MB of the file for indexing.
The file size limit is applied on the uncompressed data.”
What does this mean for SEO practices?
This update supposes changes both in content and coding placement. To ensure Googlebot can do its job, the important content should be placed in the upper position of web pages.
It also affects the coding structure, as now the SEO-related information should be placed within the first 15 MB of an HTML. Lastly, videos and images should be compressed and not encoded directly into the HTML.
Marketing Tech Updates
PEXELS / COTTONBRO
Earlier this month, Apple announced one of their most long-awaited updates for the digital marketing industry: Web push notifications will be supported in their operating system update!
This update is a game-changer for the whole internet industry, as it will enable website owners to reach the missing portion of their web users (up to 20% on a global level and higher in the US and Europe) coming from iOS users that couldn’t be reached before. This actually means that now the 100% capacity of web users is at the tip of our fingers.
As expected with the history of Apple and privacy settings, this too comes with a trick, but overall we are excited to announce that web push notification clients can expect a 50-100% uplift in the sales generated through this cookieless remarketing channel in the eCommerce industry.
If you want to learn more about this update and other interesting iOS 16 marketing updates, keep reading here.
Shopify / Picsmart
Shopify is one of the most preferred and trusted eCommerce platforms for business owners. They have had a busy year working on new updates that are expected to have a crucial impact on the eCommerce industry by introducing the new C2C era.
The “Connect to Customers” or C2C era is the way Shopify describes the upcoming consumer and market trends within the eCommerce landscape. As the company states on their website:
“We know that brands need new ways to engage with their customers—and that means creating new connections.“
With this in mind, Shopify has decided to bring to life new features that will revolutionise the digital shopping ecosystem. The company has understood the relevance of creating meaningful connections and experiences for clients.
Source: Shopify
Having said this, the new updates include +100 changes in:
Finding customers: Within this segment, they have included features such as Shopify audiences, shop cash, Twitter shopping, Dovetale, Linkpop and Marketplace kit.
Converting shoppers: We will experience tweaks and functionalities such as B2B on Shopify, Shopify point of sale, Shopify markets, checkout, shop pay enhancements, discount combinations, and pre-orders.
Enhancing branding storytelling: Updates within this section are easing the ways business owners can convey their branding on Shopify sites. The updates will enable you to accelerate the development phase by introducing pre-built components and templates. In addition, the new updates enable building products and experiences with NFTs and Tokengated Commerce
Building relationships: Aiming to increase customer loyalty, the new changes will facilitate gathering more accessible commerce insights, one-place marketing automation tools, push notifications, among others.
Tools to better run your business: Shopify has built improvements to enhance the logistic aspects of an eCommerce store. Features will impact supplier-to-buyer logistics, order and inventory management, and global shipping, among others.
Scale and build: Building high-quality stores was never easier. The new updates include third-party apps integrations, functionalities personalisation, an enhancement to data protection, apply and request capital and Shopify balance.
Source: Pexels
One of the most expected releases from WordPress this year is here. This release did not only fix +600 bugs, but it also elevated the CMS experience in the platform.
The 6.0. Arturo version aims to position WordPress as a user-friendly platform to create Open Source websites. With this in mind, the main updates are implemented in enhancements of the FSE editor, which is currently in its beta version. However, there are other relevant tweaks that will result interesting for anyone working with this tool.
The main updates include changes in:
- Styling switch editor: colours, fonts and layouts curated by theme authors.
- Expanded template creation: customising posts, index, headers, pages and other elements will be faster now. They added options such as front page, author, date, category, and tags to build tailored templates.
- Writing improvements: This update will enable users to select multiple text blocks at once to edit them, users will enjoy using keyboard shortcuts to add links, and lastly, typographic styles will persevere through changes in the block.
- Flex-based containers: This feature eases building layouts with dynamic columns and blocks.
We believe these updates will create better experiences for users building websites and also represent great changes, stepping up the game for WordPress among its competitors.
Social Media Marketing
Source: Instagram
Instagram remains committed to supporting creators to monetize their content through the app. With this in mind, Instagram has developed multiple tools to help creators build businesses.
Within the new features, we want to highlight the Creative Marketplace as a channel designed for brands and partnerships to collaborate on branded content partnerships.
The proposal feature will be rolled out as a beta version, and it includes features such as:
- In-app payments
- Discover and search creators based on profile segmentation
- Sending specific project guidelines
- Creators will be able to express their topics of interest for making branded content
Within the statements on helping creators, Instagram also mentioned they have extended their commitment of not taking any fees for any monetisation happening through Subscriptions, Badges, Paid Online Events and Bulletin until January 1, 2024.
Source: Snapchat
Snapchat reappeared with a new announcement: they are adding to their portfolio of products: a new subscription-based service.
The company stated in their blog their reasoning and some details about the update:
“Today, we’re launching Snapchat+, a collection of exclusive, experimental, and pre-release features available in Snapchat for $3.99/month. This subscription will allow us to deliver new Snapchat features to some of the most passionate members of our community and allow us to provide prioritized support,”
The membership will include exclusive and pre-release features such as being able to see who rewatched your stories or personalising the icon of the app. The new release didn’t come with many details. However, we know for now that it will be launched in specific countries, starting with the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Australia, New Zealand, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
With this release, Snapchat is joining other social media platforms that are experimenting with subscription-based models for earning revenue, such as Twitter and Telegram.
✨ TikTok has launched a NEW Trends Discovery tool ?
A new tool to discover the hottest hashtags, sounds, creators, and videos on TikTok pic.twitter.com/Xv94xcTKH2
— Matt Navarra (@MattNavarra) June 3, 2022
TikTok has announced that they have developed a trends discovery tool to help content creators and marketers to stay up to date with the latest trends and topics on the platform.
The tool is located within the Creative Centre of the app and is designed to help users analyse which content performs better than others to get inspired and have a guide when creating content. This new tool can also be used as a medium to increase engagement.
Users will be able to explore trending audio, hashtags, videos and even creators. The update comes with a useful filter search by industry and country, making it relevant for marketing purposes too.
The new tool seems promising for content creators who will be able to be contacted by brands through a simple click on the platform connecting them through TikTok Creator Marketplace.
✨ Introducing: Notes ✨
We’re testing a way to write longer on Twitter. pic.twitter.com/SnrS4Q6toX
— Twitter Write (@TwitterWrite) June 22, 2022
Twitter has released their beta testing for Notes: a new feature that will finally allow selected users from selected countries to be eligible to publish longer content.
As mentioned by the company, “The purpose of the tool we are testing is to provide an additional experience for writers on Twitter outside of Tweets,”
The details Twitter has revealed include a length of up to 100 words for titles, while the body of the Notes content is limited to 2,500 words. This is certainly a stark difference from their current 280-character limited posts. With this new update, the edition after publishing would be finally possible too.
This new release aims to be as accessible as possible, which is why Notes will have a unique URL that users can reach regardless if they are logged into the platform or have a Twitter account.
Frizbit Updates
Save the Date! A new roundtable to discover solutions for eCommerce from leading experts on July 20th is coming up
In this roundtable, we have gathered 3 experts from the most innovative tech startups in Barcelona: Vidjet, Spitche, and Frizbit to come together in this lively event.
Tim, one of the best Growth Consultants and our moderator for this occasion, will take you through a thriving experience to unveil the industry secrets, insights, challenges, solutions, and future consumer trends from these leading experts. We assure you, you wouldn’t like to miss this event.
Staying up to date and learning the latest theories is always one of the best practices, but we can agree that often theory is misleading from practice. That’s why this roundtable will bring so much value to you, revealing knowledge that we can’t find in books.
Naturally, after-work drinks and networking could not be missing from this thrilling roundtable, so in addition to learning about the best day-to-day practices and tips, you will also be invited to enjoy some free beers on a beautiful terrace in Barcelona.
The Details:
Topic: Dream Tech Stack for E-commerce with top eCommerce tech startups of Barcelona
Moderator: Tim Cakir
Speakers: Ata Gur – Co-founder & CEO of Frizbit; Kevin Markowski – Co-founder & CEO of Spitche and Baptiste Nicolas – Co-founder & CEO of Vidjet
When: Wednesday, July 20th, registration starts at 18.30h
Where: Aticco Verdaguer, Barcelona.
Language: English
FREE ENTRY
