Digital Marketing Week in Review by Four Dots: August 2020, Week 2

Hello and welcome to another edition of Digital Marketing Week in Review by Four Dots – our weekly column where we comb through some of the most relevant news and events that took place within the digital marketing landscape over the last week or so.

Let’s see what “August 2020: Week 2” edition brings us:   

• Here’s What People Searched the Most on YouTube During the Pandemic
• TikTok’s Biggest Competitor “Instagram Reels” Launches Worldwide 
• Facebook Updates (Majorly) the Messenger Plugin For Businesses 
• Google Ads Now Lets Advertisers Capture Leads From YouTube
• ‘Article’ Markup is now Supported in Google’s Rich Results Test Tool 
• The New Content-Visibility CSS property Can Boost Your Rendering Performance

Alrighty then, let’s dive right in! 

 

Here’s What People Searched the Most on YouTube During the Pandemic

YouTube has recently released a brand new set of data into the public which included insights about what topics YouTube users searched the most since the COVID-19 pandemic started.

The reported data is quite interesting, but not too surprising. The majority of query topics included cooking, self-care, home-improvement, religion, social connection at a distance, etc. 

YouTube’s official report is packed with useful insights and accompanied with rich visuals, which can be helpful to digital marketers around the globe in terms of content strategy tweaking and pivoting. 

Here are some examples of the charts provided in the report:

(Image Source: Youtube)

(Image Source: Youtube)

As the company itself states, the uniformity of worldwide search queries during the pandemic is nothing short of “astonishing.”

 

TikTok’s Biggest Competitor “Instagram Reels” Launches Worldwide 

Instagram Reels, Facebook’s answer to TikTok, is a brand new 15-second video platform and it is officially rolling out in 50 countries, including the US.

The new video-based upgrade offers numerous TikTok-like features, and considering its parent company, Reels will definitely pose as the strongest competition to TikTok (which is currently the fastest-growing video-based social media app in the world).

Instagram Reels provides its users with the following features: 

• Create and share videos up to 15 seconds in length.
• Custom audio clips can be added to the videos, while the users can also opt for a song from a catalog of licensed music, or grab audio from other videos.
• The “Featured Reels” section that promotes popular clips.

(Image Source: Facebook)

Instagram Reels content can be shared with other Instagram users in their main feeds, while the Explore tab (a brand new Instagram section) is also available to users who want to discover Reels. The latter is a great way for Reels users to reach people who are not already following them.

Videos that manage to reach the “Featured” status in the Explore section can receive even more exposure. 

To learn more about how to create and share Reels, and what the difference between Reels and TikTok is, visit this SEJ article. 

 

Facebook Updates (Majorly) the Messenger Plugin For Businesses 

Facebook is introducing a major update to the Facebook Chat Plugin for business websites. The new feature will enable visitors to chat with businesses over Messenger and it can be used by users who aren’t logged into Facebook.

This Facebook Chat Plugin update will allow businesses to more easily reach existing customers through their website, but it will also help them reach new customers and thus grow their clientele. 

The plugin gets a brand new design as well. The new interface should create an easier and more intuitive conversation environment. 

This is an important update as it allows visitors who do not have a Facebook account (and we know just how obsolete this platform is becoming by the day) to quickly communicate with the website. 

“As a developer, it’s much easier to convince a business to use a live chat offering that is available to all their customers,” says Soma Toth, the founder of Recart. 

“Our business customers are seeing sales directly tied to engagement on Messenger, and the Chat Plugin helps them leverage the same investment across both their Facebook page and their website at no additional cost. It also reduces the complexity of having to work with or support a fallback for users who are not logged into Facebook.”

Read more about the plugin update here. 

 

Google Ads Now Lets Advertisers Capture Leads From YouTube

Advertisers can now catch leads when users are watching videos on YouTube as Google introduces lead form extensions to ads for YouTube and Discovery campaigns.

Google first added lead form extensions last year, enabling advertisers to capture leads via search campaigns. Now, this can be done via YouTube and Discover campaigns as well.

These lead forms appear whenever a user clicks on the ad. The ad then expands into a conversion form that a user can choose to fill out and submit. A user can do this without leaving the screen they’re currently on, which is quite convenient and will likely bring more engagement.

Early Jeep Case Study

Among the earliest tests was the Jeep brand case study that reportedly saw a 10-fold increase in completed leads. The test covered the leads coming from YouTube. 

(Image Source: SEJ)

The company stated that utilizing lead form extensions proved to be the most cost-efficient channel for lead generation across all ad platforms.

 

‘Article’ Markup is now Supported in Google’s Rich Results Test Tool 

Google’s Rich Results Test tool is being updated to support article structured data markup. This means that publishers can now use this tool to validate their ‘article’ structured data markup more easily.

We are happy to announce support for Article structured data in the Rich Results Test tool. Read more about the markup in our developer documentation https://t.co/8osWelZNwu or test your pages at https://t.co/AGp8xwSsDK pic.twitter.com/YjuomwwnMl

— Google Search Central (@googlesearchc) August 10, 2020

‘Article’ structured data is typically used to markup blogs, news, sports article pages, etc; which can improve the page’s performance in search results. Enhanced features most often involve placement in:

• top stories carousel
• host carousel
• visual stories

The updated Rich Results Test tool now allows website owners to see if their markup has been properly implemented, enabling them to correct any potential markup errors before the article is published.

 

The New Content-Visibility CSS property Can Boost Your Rendering Performance

We saved the best for last. 

Chromium 85 will feature the content-visibility property that should be among the most impactful new CSS properties when it comes to boosting page load performance. 

The new property enables automatic or script management of content visibility, with the main goal of allowing the user agent to skip an element’s rendering work (layout and painting included) until there’s a need for it. Without rendering, a significant portion of the content is located off-screen. 

This CSS property enables faster page loading for the initial user, allowing for smoother interaction with onscreen content and – ultimately – improved UX.

As for browser support, the new content-visibility CSS property relies on primitives within the CSS Containment Spec and is currently supported only in Chromium 85, while it has been deemed “worth prototyping” for Firefox. 

You can read a more detailed report on this property here. 

 

Wrapping Up

That would be all for this installment of Digital Marketing Week in Review by Four Dots. See you next week, until then – feel free to check out our previous edition!