Welcome to Episode 330 of Hit the Mic with The Stacey Harris.
Welcome to 2017. I’m so amped. Today, we kick off the new show format. We kick off the new show schedule. We’re going live this week on Thursday. I’m super exited to tell you about something else we’ve got going on this month. I’m so ready for the New Year. I’m so excited. 2017 is going to be a big, big year for us, because we’re going to do some big things this year together. To kick that off though, I want to talk about the epic amount of things that happened in social media in December, because this stuff, is going to impact the changes you are making. It’s going to impact the plans you are rolling out. I’m guessing, for several of you, there are plans already rolling, and for more than a few of you, there’s probably plans still in the making, which is totally cool, but either way, this is stuff you need to know, because it’s going to impact the way you market on social media this month, for sure, and definitely this year.
Each month, the first Tuesday of the month, we will do this episode of Three Things You Must Know That Month. It’ll be all about the changes that have happened, the trends that we’re seeing, things that are going on. Occasionally, it’ll be more fundamental, more foundational, but this month is so jam-packed with changes from the networks, that it’s going to be all about that. Now if you want to know this stuff right when it happens, the best place to find that stuff out is Hit the Mic Backstage. Also, be sure to join us back there if you haven’t, hitthemicbackstage.com, of course, is the place to go for that. I highly recommend that, because again, we talk about it right as these happen. I share it right in the forum. With resources, we can dig into questions. “What does this mean for me?” It’s really the upgrade to this episode. This experience, but every month we will be doing one of these episodes where we talk about these changes, so let’s jump in. Are you in? Let’s do it.
Change number one, or network number one. We’re going to break this down by network today. These are not all of the changes that happened, by the way, in December. There were a lot of them, and if we reviewed all of them in the course of this episode, it would be an hour and a half long. These are the ones that I want you to know about primarily. If you wanted, again, to know all of the changes, join us Backstage. Let’s talk about Facebook. Facebook has rolled out their new page layout. It’s really, really unattractive, I think, but I like the priority that you can give things. You can actually adjust what comes first, the photos, the videos, your posts, whatever. This allows those of us who are really going all in on live video this year to, and consistent video content, to really prioritize that content up at the top of our profile, and people land right there. They see it, so that’s really cool.
You’ll also see when you look at the sidebar on the right, you’ll see your numbers for page links, and things like that, are a lot smaller, so you’re not getting the same priority. You’re not getting the same sort of emphasis on that like number, which I really like. I think is a really interesting take on the page. I know that there are going to be a lot of people who don’t like that, because they have spent a lot of time and a lot of money making sure that number got big. Personally, though, I’m a big fan of the smaller number, because I don’t think it has as much credibility as people like to think that it does, but you’ll see that that number has gotten smaller. You’ll also see that About area, if you’ve got your messages turned on, you’ll see your messages, and then you’ll see right there, a link.
Instead of your About area having your Bio in it, your Bio is … That short little note about you, it’s a little bit higher up above where the page likes information is. It’s actually a little bit larger text wise, than it was in the old layout. You’ve also got some featured stuff. You can change around that featured stuff. Again, for those of us who are going all in on video, that might be a really smart thing to do, but whatever. Kind of like your cover photo, it’s probably going to change based on what you have going on at the moment. What you’re promoing, what you’re, if you’re getting ready to launch, you’re obviously going to have different things there than you would at other times. All right, but I wanted you to know that page has changed it looks, so don’t get so bogged down in just putting content out on the page. That you’re not making sure that the page and the user experience when people land on your page, is still solid. Is still doing what you want it to do, so go in and do that refresher.
Do those updates. This is a really [cooler 00:05:30] time to update that cover photo, update that profile photo. That’s something I’m going to be working on in the next, this month. Update these things and make sure that just everything that you’re seeing there is stuff that you want people to be seeing. Especially if you’re somebody who maybe hasn’t uploaded photos, or uploaded videos in a while, and the stuff that’s there is really outdated. It might mean you need to remove it and you need to put something up there in its place. Okay. All right. Number two. We’re going to talk about SnapChat. Yes, SnapChat made changes, too, and we’re going to talk about Instagram changes in a minute, but I want to end there, so we’re going to talk quickly about SnapChat.
SnapChat has made a couple of changes. The first one is the ability to take a photo and then make anything in the photo or the video, excuse me, a sticker. You could essentially take a picture of your face, and then cut out just your face, and then make a whole bunch of your faces all over it. It’s kind of a fun change. I’m curious to see how people implement it. I have seen some really, really fantastic, creative, awesome ones, and I’ve seen some really, really creepy ones, so use on the cool side and not the creepy side, okay, guys? The other change, which I think is really cool is Group Chat, and this is going to be really awesome for anyone who is wanting to support people, or clients, or share something with multiple people.
I really love this selfishly in my personal life, because I can snap things to friends and be like, “Hey, guys. Here’s what’s going on,” so I don’t know that there’s going to be a good, a good marketing tool for this, but I wanted you to be aware of it, because I do have a sneaking suspicion there’s going to be a lot of really bad marketing uses for it. I’ve already gotten a couple of group requests, or group chats, where it’s just a blanket sales message that they chatted to all of us. Yeah, which is not good, guys. Don’t do that, but you can remove yourself from the chat, and anything you’ve said in the chat will disappear along with you, so that’s something to note. I wanted to bring this up, just because I feel like there will be a lot of people using this irresponsibly, and there will be some push back from some of you on SnapChat because of it, so let’s wrap it up with what you all have been waiting for, the Instagram changes.
Instagram went crazy in December, and I think the thing that excited me most about it was that it was such a great example of the fact that December does not mean you have to lay back. December does not mean you have to wait to see what happens. Come out with your biggest and your baddest punches, because it was absolutely some big, big changes in December to Instagram. Number one, we can now heart and reply to comments. If you’re not seeing it, go ahead and tap on the comments, so where it says how many comments there are, tap on that, and you’ll see a list of all the comments. Even if there’s just one. That’s where you’ll see the engagement options. I thought that was really cool when that launched, and then the ability to go live on Instagram rolled out. I got really excited. Then I had to wait a couple of days because I didn’t get it right away, and I was sad, but anyways, the things to know about Instagram Live.
Number one. You’re going to get a notification when anyone goes live. Number two. Your audience will get a notification when you go live. Number three. It exists only for the amount of time you are alive. There’s not currently any replay, there’s not currently any option to save. It’s just not there right now. I don’t know if it will be. Unfortunately, the folks over at Instagram do not loop me in on those emails, but I suspect at some point, there will be, but that’s just me. For right now, there’s not, so pay attention to that. If you are sharing stuff, this is not going to be something people can find later, but it’s a really cool way to share a special offer, a special bonus, and act now kind of thing. It’s going to be a really cool option for that stuff.
The third update, not nearly as exciting as Live, but I’m doing this in chronological order, was the ability to Save Posts, so you can now, if you see something like an ad, or a promo, or something you want to make sure you comment on later, you can now save it. When you save it, you’re just going to hit a little tab in the lower right hand corner of the image. It’ll look like sort of like a bookmark call out, when you’re bookmarking a page on your Kindle, and what’s cool about this, is it’s private. You go to your Profile, you can see a list of all the things you’ve saved. No one else can see that list.
I really like this. Again, totally selfishly, because oftentimes, I see people who I follow post really great stuff, and I’m like, “Oh, that’s fantastic. I want to read that, but I’m heading out the door,” or whatever, and so I can come back to it later now. I can actually save it, and that makes me really excited, because I’m really, really awful about forgetting about it. As are our customers, so if there’s something like that, make sure you’re testing out a call to action, to not just go to a link in the Bio, but to save that post to remind them. I’m going to be testing that out over the next couple weeks in seeing how that works. Now that this ability to save is more widely known, and as people are using it more, so I’m really excited.
All right. I just ran through those super fast, but again, Facebook updates, SnapChat updates, Instagram updates, updates galore. The best way to stay out of overwhelm and in the know, join us Backstage. Hitthemicbackstage.com. Right now, come join us, come ask questions about these changes. Come share how you are going to use these changes, because of course, we are all better together. All right. Happy 2017, and I will see you Backstage.
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