LinkedIn Stories: The New Elevator Pitch?
By: Jiho Chung

In an effort to refresh its practices of recruitment and networking, LinkedIn rolled out to the United States and Canada last Thursday: “Stories,” the ephemeral content vastly popular on social media platforms such as Snapchat, Instagram, and Facebook. Like the major social media giants, LinkedIn Stories includes messaging (including emojis) to first degree connections and soon, integration with teleconferencing programs like Zoom, BlueJeans, and Microsoft’s Teams along with rendering in LinkedIn search results.

Although recognized as an aging platform, Stories among other updates (i.e., softer, better consumer-minded site redesign) couldn’t have arrived at a more opportune time as the economy is recovering especially for recent post-secondary education graduates during a pandemic. 

Also, unlike the major social media platforms, brands can now share robust testimonials that advocate a company’s set of values and strengths as opposed to reviews found on Indeed and Google per se, and leverage it as a source of content marketing to define a company’s mission statement in a more interactive, digestible way. With advertising on the horizon for these updates, many especially small businesses and start-ups can later aim to have LinkedIn bring a more targeted audience at a greater scale and efficiency. 

However, what can substantiate its refresh and updates is a sweeping change required internally with its staffing infrastructure and resources having worked on several LinkedIn campaigns and experiencing a severe lack of customer support. We can only hope that this isn’t just new paint on an old house but rather a gut job that LinkedIn needs now more than ever.

Triller Bets Big on Creators
By: Jessica Bedussi

While the fate of TikTok hangs in a purgatory of uncertainty, rival app Triller has taken the opportunity to find its footing. TikTok’s bad press around privacy and current threats of a ban has led users to look for an alternative.

Triller responded with everything from direct attacks on TikTok’s marketing to poaching the app’s biggest talent. According to Ryan Kavanaugh, one of Triller’s execs, the app’s strategy is to “shake shit up.” This strategy seems to be working, at least in the short term. Triller boasts impressive, but hotly contested numbers: 250M downloads, 65M monthly active users, and $250M in funding.

However, in order to remain relevant long-term and avoid the path of apps like Quibi, Triller must maintain these numbers past a short flash in the pan. And Triller hopes to do so by betting big on a creator-focused strategy. Here are three ways Triller plans to attract creators:

1. Hire TikTok influencers in executive positions
   In a bold move, Triller hired Richards, an 18-year-old TikTok influencer, as their Chief Strategy Officer to ensure creators’ voices were a part of all strategic moves. Richards is known more for shirtless thirst traps on TikTok than strategic acumen so his business expertise is yet to be proven.

2. Split ad revenue directly with creators
   Triller recently launched “Crosshype,” its first foray into advertising. This platform equally splits revenue between the app and creators. Additionally, Triller markets influencer partnerships to brands through guaranteed impressions, something immeasurable with a typical influencer campaign. 

3. Invest big into influencers
   Triller’s rise to popularity can be attributed to its spend on influencers. The app has gone after the biggest creators on TikTok, including Charli D’Amelio and her family. This hefty investment has proven to bring new users and views to the platform, but may not necessarily keep new users on the app. Quibi used this approach when it launched, getting a huge spike in downloads but unable to sustain long-term usage. 

We’ve seen many apps shine hot and burn quickly, so the fate of Triller is still up in the air. If the platform can attract more creators and prove value to users, it may very well be a TikTok contender.

Removing the 20% Text Rule 
By: Sergio Saucedo

Facebook has just announced that they will be removing their restriction on the amount of text allowed on Facebook ads. For years Facebook has been requiring advertisers to keep the amount of text that they put on their ads to 20% or less given that their internal data had shown that ads with less text on the image perform higher. 

However, this has always been a point of contention given that the social platform would throttle or not show an advertisers ad if it didn't meet this standard. Requiring advertisers to make numerous back and forth adjustments in order to adhere to their ad rules.  

Facebook's Help Center page still recommends “keeping your text short, clear and concise in order to get your message across effectively.” Lifting this restriction, will benefit advertisers across the globe and will enable more creative freedom to play around with text (if they choose so) on their next social campaign.

More than 65 million people watched the first debate between President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden Tuesday night. The television audience for the debate was down from the first debate between Trump and Hillary Clinton in 2016, but it was higher than almost every other debate in recent years.

Click here to view presidential debate facts and numbers.