Growth Marketing Lessons you can Learn from Tinder

edgylabs.com

Tinder has been downloaded over 50M times. We discuss growth lessons you can learn from the dating app’s astronomical growth.

Tinder was launched in September 2012 but didn’t grow much in the first few months.

It was in 2013 that the location-based dating app gained massive popularity in the app world. In just over a year, Tinder had 10 million users and generated over 20 million matches.

By the end of 2014, Tinder had been downloaded over 40 million times.

Tinder Growth | Parantap

How did Tinder achieve such staggering growth in a short amount of time in a niche that is pretty much considered to be saturated?

Short answer: Tinder did things differently. Long answer: read on in detail below.

1. Create a Flawless User Experience

One of the key levers to Tinder’s growth was its amazing user experience.

Before Tinder, all dating platforms were mostly web-based and pretty much the same. All of them would require you to create a lengthy profile of yourself to attract potential dates.

Tinder changed this. Tinder created a gamified experience that resembled how we make snap decisions in real life.

“WE WANT TO CREATE EXPERIENCES THAT EMULATE HUMAN BEHAVIOR. WHAT WE DO ON TINDER IS NO DIFFERENT THAN WHAT WE ALREADY DO.” – SEAN RAD, TINDER CEO

With a simple swipe to either left or right, with left meaning “No” and right meaning “Yes“, a user could express interest or disinterest in potential dates based on a few photos.

Tinder Onboarding | Apptimize

Only when a match is created (when two people swipe right to each other’s profile), would users be able to message each other.

2. Identify and Leverage the Right Network

“If you build it they will come” mentality doesn’t work anymore. No matter how awesome your product is, you still have to find a way to get the word out there.
Like most startups, Tinder faced a similar problem of getting people to use their app. They had a great product but they needed users.

Tinder faced the classic chicken and egg problem two-sided marketplaces face. They needed men and women on the platform to achieve liquidity.

Most importantly, they needed women first to get the guys to use it.

Whitney Wolfe, Tinder’s VP of Marketing at the time came up with a plan to recruit influencers on U.S. college campuses as brand ambassadors. This immediately fueled a network effect spreading the product across multiple campuses through word of mouth.

Soon Tinder downloads were being used as tickets to attend frat parties.

Wolfe also gave presentations about the app on various campuses and got people who attended the presentations to download the app.

As a result, Tinder became very popular among people between the ages of 18-23. To date, this age range makes up 57% of all Tinder users.

In a nutshell, Tinder created a product with an awesome UX experience and introduced it to the right audience who also had the power to promote it.

Snapchat will push content outside its own app

uk.businessinsider.com

Snapchat is reportedly looking to publish its content outside its app for the first time with 'Stories Everywhere'

• Snap is reportedly developing a program called Stories Everywhere that will allow third-party publishers to embed Snapchat content on their websites.
• Stories Everywhere will be used to accelerate Snapchat's user growth, which has been stalling. 

SnapChat maker Snap is getting ready to take some of its content beyond its app: Snap is developing a new program dubbed Stories Everywhere that will allow third-party publishers to embed Snapchat content on their websites, according to a new Cheddar report.

Snap didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

The project is being led by Rahul Chopra, who perviously served as CEO of the social news aggregation service Storyful, as well as global head of video for News Corp. Chopra joined Snap in December, according to his Linkedin profile, which calls him the company’s “head of stories everywhere, content.”

The idea behind Stories Everywhere is to accelerate user growth for Snapchat, which has been stalling. Cheddar’s report likened it to Twitter’s decision to allow the embedding of tweets in third-party websites.

Allowing publishers to embed Snapchat Stories on their websites could potentially also help convince the company’s partners to stick with the format, which has been a bit of a mixed bag for some. Last week, news broke that CNN is axing its daily Snapchat news show “The Update”just four months after its launch because of a lack of monetization opportunities.

4 Features to Highlight When Launching Your New Business App

business.com

It's hard to make an app stand out in the crowded market. These are four aspects you'll want to emphasize about yours to make sure users know it's a quality app when you launch it.

If you are preparing to launch your new app into the market soon, you are likely aware of the stiff competition you will face. With over 12 million apps available across the leading online stores, making your program stand out can be a daunting task.

Across the board, developers and users agree that ease of use and intuitive capabilities are the most important features. So, while user experience must be at the top of your priorities list, it is also important to highlight the unique features that make your app appealing.

To attract customers to your new app, you must create a strong and enticing value proposition that encourages them to give it a shot. Here are some of the top features that should play a prominent role in your promotion.

1. Graphics and user experience

Seventy-five percent of mobile app revenue is generated by apps that feature high-quality graphics, making them one of the key factors for success. These apps are set apart by their superior design, strong graphics quality and innovative elements that keep audiences entertained for hours on end. Graphics signal quality to the user. They are what creates a unique visual experience.

Remember, graphics are not limited to the gaming category, though they do play an important role in the success of an entertainment app. No matter what category your app falls into, high-quality graphics will always make it a clear choice against the competition. Ultimately, the graphics are what create the intrinsic feel of your program.

2. Nostalgia

Millennials make up the largest consumer group of mobile app usage, making them the most profitable and sought-after segment in the market. Interestingly enough, if you really want to capture their attention, all you need to do is remind them of the good old days.

Millennials strongly connect with apps that evoke sentiment. This is due to the strong emotional connection they have to the toys they played with and the stories that kept them entertained when they were children. Need proof? There are entire categories of content on BuzzFeed dedicated to the '90s.

Unsurprisingly, businesses have a lot to learn from the entertainment sector here. Connect with your audience by stirring up some nostalgia with throwback storylines and characters. Tapping into nostalgia by bringing back beloved characters and stories from childhood is a great way to get this large market excited about your app.

3. Personalization

Personalizing the UX is one of the best tactics for app design. In fact, 71 percent of consumers have paid more for a brand service that offered more personalized experiences for them.

Take Pandora's music app as a great example. When Pandora introduced its Music Genome Project, it made sure all of its customers knew what a difference personalization could make in the streaming service. The unique technology gave Pandora a strong value proposition as it went head-to-head with competing music streaming services like Spotify and Tidal.

Tell your customers just how your app can be tailored to them specifically, whether it be customizable colors and layouts or curated content based on their preferences. A little personalization can provide a more engaging and authentic UX, which can dramatically improve customer loyalty.

4. Multiplatform capabilities

Making your app compatible with multiple screen sizes and capabilities may take some extra work for your development team, but it's a feature you simply cannot omit. Bock & Company conducted a study to determine which features were most important in mobile app development, and 71 percent of respondents agreed that multiplatform capabilities were extremely valuable to end users.

Emphasize your app's usability across all devices, like Yelp did with its featured blog post announcing its Apple Watch-friendly version. These days, users often switch back and forth between smartphones, tablets and wearable tech. The option to use the same app across multiple devices is a great feature to highlight.

The key to a successful launch is marketing the right way from the start and highlighting the key features. Always keep in mind that the end user is the most important piece of the puzzle for success. Make sure that you clearly explain just why that person needs to give your app a shot. Good luck!

Where does brand safety go from here?

mobilemarketer.com

As the industry continues to prove, even the most finely crafted digital ad campaign can be twisted if threats to brand safety aren't actively addressed. Digital advertising is becoming increasingly automated, with programmatic ad buys made with vast publisher networks placing ads besides all kinds of content, and at a scale beyond what could ever be vetted by human eyes. When this associated content is problematic for the brand — and viewers notice and share screenshots across social media — it can become a viral event that hijacks the ad campaign and corrupts any goodwill it had earned. This issue has now become top of mind among brand marketers, as a CMO Council survey found that 72% of CMOs said they face pressure from their bosses to secure brand trust.

Advertisers were awakened to the severity of these brand safety risks earlier this year, as reports detailed the inability of the Google Display Network and YouTube to effectively protect brands from having their ads placed alongside hate speech and terrorist propaganda. A boycott by major companies ensued. More recently, in June, P&G Chief Brand Officer Marc Pritchard announced that the consumer goods giant would focus on the "quality and craft" it expects ad publishers to demonstrate in overseeing the safety of content. P&G, which is one of the world's largest advertisers by media spend and an influential voice in the industry, has also signaled its intention to shrink its marketing spend by $2 billion over the next five years, eyeing improvements to ad quality and transparency that will allow it to do more with less. As major players such as P&G shine a spotlight on brand safety and the risk of reputational damage from careless ad placements, expect the industry to increasingly demand solutions to this issue.

In the meantime, there are several approaches for brands to pursue in safeguarding the quality of the ad inventory they purchase. One method is to rely on private marketplaces or direct ad buys from site publishers. This offers advertisers the opportunity to select premium, vetted ad space associated with content and audiences well-suited to their brands. One caveat in the case of these premium publishers, however, is that unless they have insight into each page within their ad inventory, the possibility still exists of placing ads beside inappropriate content that these reputable entities unwittingly provide.

Contextual targeting can also serve brands by allowing ad content to be matched with the editorial content of a page, ensuring relevance and promoting engagement while avoiding more objectionable content. This can include content categorization at the page level, identifying and classifying content not only to determine if it's objectionable, but also recognizing hundreds of other criteria to maximize the specificity of contextual targeting. This strategy makes use of artificial intelligence, machine learning and human quality assurance in determining the nature of content. It's important to note that what's appropriate for each brand involves a component of cultural context and isn't universal. For example, an ad placement on a website intended for adult audiences may be on-brand for an underwear retailer, but a disaster for a children's toy brand. This is why deeper insights and transparency into where online ads pop up is so crucial to brand safety.

As it stands, content categorization does come with a few challenges. Analyzing the written content on a webpage and analyzing image or video content are very different tasks, and all-in-one approaches that appropriately categorize all types of content are hard to come by. Videos and images are often more difficult to vet for brand safety than text simply because it can be more interpretive or ambiguous in nature. Content can also be embedded in a separate iframe, where solutions can't effectively analyze it. Content categorization approaches to brand safety are also trickier for marketers targeting mobile apps because the inventory consists not of webpages, but multimedia-rich apps. These apps are locked down by the app publisher's SDK, making it a challenge for any third-party to analyze its ever-evolving content. Mobile app marketers concerned about brand safety should instead rely on apps' reputations and content ratings rather than the content categorization techniques.

These limitations aside, targeted ad buys and content categorization still have a lot to offer when it comes to enhancing brand safety. Brands blindly placing ads online take a greater risk than they realize, too often resulting in reputational damage, embarrassment or lost sales. By taking appropriate measures to understand where the ads they buy will ultimately be displayed, brands can both safeguard their name and target their campaigns to be viewed in the most appropriate context.

10 Tips To Improve Mobile App Conversion

theinscribermag.com

Nowadays it is impossible to imagine a good business without a website or even an application for different mobile services.

However, lots of the entrepreneurs still ignore the great potential of the usage of various techniques of the creation of an application for the mobile devices, what later may lead for the reduction of the number of customers and visitors. For example, in the 21st-century mobiles already overtake the laptop industry, while being sometimes much more powerful, than modern computers.

As a result, we may say, that the usage of smartphones is much more frequent nowadays than the usage of common computers. Due to this, we can not underestimate the real potential of the usage of these applications and those highly beneficial features, which they have inside them.

Because of the fact, that sometimes people tend to think, that innovations are not the best business making tools, I am willing to describe you something in that article.

As you may know, in the world of cyber business there is such a term as user engagement. It means an opportunity of a developer or an owner of that particular business to turn common visitors of the websites to real customers or even faithful users.

So, what if I say, that one of the most effective ways of the development of that user engagement is the creation of an application for the development of your business.

However, there is also another side of the coin. It is not enough to have just an app. That particular application has to have good conversion rate, what will later allow you to attract much more people and promote and boost your response on a directly new level.

Thus, in that article, you will see top 10 techniques, which will allow you to improve an app conversion rate.

1. The Importance of Testing

One of the most prominent features of the development of the app conversion is the arrangement of the testing processes all the time. You may ask, why it is so vital? The answer is really simple. In order to create a good application there should not be any mistakes and bugs.

So, due to this, it might be possible to implement any designing and technological innovations into an application. Besides, thanks to the creation of a properly organised and working extension we makes the whole process of surfing within it much more convenient for a user, what definitely play a pretty important role.

2. First Impression and Design

In any situation, when you are dealing with any cyber products, one of the most elements is the look of the design and the interface of an application. Nowadays, people, who are using IT technologies and especially the Internet are aimed on the usage of simple and clear functions, buttons and parameters.

All of these demands may be fulfilled with the creation of a proper UX design. What is actually UX? Frankly, UX means a design, which is able to be used intuitively with no obstacles and problems of the users. So, it is really vital for a developer to have a good UX designer in his team, what later may not let you regret about your decisions.

3. Encouraging the Users

In the 21st century people will not do anything with no encouragement. That is why, in order to attract people’s attention to your application it is really vital to arrange various advertising campaigns and special offers. Usually people, who are actually animals, tend to base the relations in the societies, while basing them on deals.

It is properly seen in the whole system of world currencies. So, the same situation os with the creation of an application. Your potential users have to see, that there are several things, which you may be able to offer instead of their attention and purchases, which will bring your company more revenues and popularity.

4. Is It Important to Follow the Trends?

One of the main aspects, which tend to play the most important role in the development of your application and especially in the improvement of its level of conversion is an opportunity of a developer to follow the trend and monitor all the news from the technological field in order to keep up with all the innovations.

I am talking so seriously now because of the fact, that people, the users, always like something revolutionary new and absolutely unknown, die to this, it is highly vital to be able to present these audience something creative from time to time, what will give you an opportunity to impress them and hold in a right way.

5. Defining an Audience

The functionality of an application or a website and its opportunity make real customers from common visitors usually depend on a major audience. That major audience has to be properly defined by the main developer, who is actually arranging all of the needed operations focused on the attraction of people.

Furthermore, while basing on the major community of the users, you may say, that all of the advertising strategies and even goods depends on their statement and their Willig’s. So, if you want to keep your app in a proper shape, it is really important to be able to define a right audience.

6. Use Both Platforms

The usage of two most popular platforms for the development of an application may help you to attract the much bigger audience. Lost of the programmers are interested in how to port ios to android or vise-versa just in order to be able to occupy bigger fields of business. Thus, in case if you recognize the same techniques, you may increase your app conversion really rapidly.

7. Make an App Useful

One of the main priorities for the development of a good application with a good conversion rate is the creation of useful extension. In order to make the whole project really nice, one of the main things, which you have to do is to implement all of those features, which in the future may really help the user, not annoy or bore him. That is why the usage of push-notifications becomes more and more popular for a year to a year.

8. Personalization

For a better understanding of the inside and background structure of an app you are arranging, one of the most important things, that you have to do is to allow the users to personalize it. In other words, make them feel free to alter the main pieces of the interface in a manner they want, what will not affect the core functionality of an application. In case if people are able to arrange their working place in a way they want, it means, that they might have a desire to come back more and more frequently.

9. Simplicity of the Registration

Do you remember these giants forms, which you were obliged to fill in before the registration on a website? It was awful, wasn’t it? However, nowadays with the development of Google and Facebook, the registration is not a problem at all. Remember, in order to make the lives of the app users much more comfortable and convenient, remember to implement a fast registration machine into an app.

10. Avoid Annoying Ads

I believe, that you know, how annoying can be all those advertising extensions, which you can see in various applications. However, in good ones, all the ads have to be located in the places, where a user can see them but will not be irritated with their presence. So, keep in mind, that for a successful usage and promotion of an app, it is a great mistake to put banners, which equals the screen size.

Conclusion

Finally, the improvement of app conversion is not an easy task at all. In that job it is a really important work with the details in a really precise manner and be as accurate as only possible, that is why one of the main qualities of any person involved in that field is vigilance and an opportunity to keep balance.

127 Facts You Probably Didn’t Know About Video Marketing [Infographic]

websitebuilder.org.uk

When the first video was launched back in 1994, little did we know that it would become one of the most powerful marketing tools. The impressive growth of all things digital over the last two decades brought about many innovative marketing strategies. Today, the video is a cutting-edge marketing approach and a powerful tool for creating content that is personal, relevant and leaves a memorable impression on your audience.

Visuality is the biggest strength of video marketing. Thanks to its viral nature, a video’s reach knows no boundaries. And by 2019, video will completely take over the internet.

This infographic was created by the Website Builder team to show you why videos are praised as the future of marketing and help you keep up with this growing trend.

Special thanks to showbox.com for their insights.

Original Post: http://websitebuilder.org.uk/blog/127-facts-you-probably-didnt-know-about-the-video-marketing/

Report: These business web apps dominated the market in 2017

techrepublic.com
IT decision makers planning new SaaS investments for 2018 can find some guidance from this Zapier report of the fastest growing, biggest, and hottest new trends in web apps
 

Web app integrator Zapier has released its annual list of web apps and software trends dominating the workplace.

In it, Zapier highlights which web apps saw the most growth, which new apps were the most popular, and trends that stood out among its more than 900 web app integrations.

Keep that last bit in mind: This report is thorough and it contains a lot of good data for companies planning their SaaS budgets for 2018, but it is limited to web apps that integrate with Zapier. The major players are there, but looking for similar products not featured in this report is still worthwhile.

The leading web apps of 2017

Facebook Lead Ads dominated the growth list: It experienced 623% user growth in 2017. Behind it were video conferencing app Zoom, with 273% growth, Google Forms, with 231% growth, Microsoft Excel, with 216% growth, and marketing email automation platform Drip, which experienced 212% growth.

New web apps that experienced the fastest growth were led by Facebook Messenger bot maker ManyChat, LinkedIn Lead Gen Forms, CRM and accounting software Dubsado, project management tool Zenkit, and email automation platform Mailshake.

Even the top five of those two categories reveals some trends: Marketing is king for web apps. Facebook Lead Ads, Drip, ManyChat, LinkedIn Lead Gen Forms, Google Forms, and Mailshake are all lead generation tools. Together they give rise to the most readily apparent of Zapier's conclusions:

"If there's one trend that ties this year's most popular apps together, it's that gathering leads and figuring out which of your ads are actually working is suddenly easy."

Trends for a specific audience

It's worth noting again that the trends Zapier found come with a major caveat: They're trends from Zapier-integrated apps. This report makes it seem like marketing is the dominant force in web apps when the reality could be different.

If your business has a marketing department, then the trend data gathered from the report is worth looking at if your marketing team is still planning for 2018.

One major trend Zapier points out is that social media is now THE way to gather data. Instead of directly advertising, companies can gather user data through discount programs (with a Google Forms signup, for example) and through chatbot interaction on a company's website or Facebook page.

The second major trend the report mentions is how email marketing is changing. The email tools that top the list are those that generate customized messages for each user. Traditional emails, Zapier notes, don't cut it anymore.

Third, integration is king. Much of the software featured in the report has been around for a while, but now integrates easily with other platforms thanks to APIs. If you're looking for new software, be sure it has flexible integration capabilities. Stand-alone software is a thing of the past.

To find out more about the leading web apps of 2017, check out the full report at Zapier.com.

When games bring brands into play

thehindubusinessline.com

Catching them young: In the hunt for customers and effective engagement, marketers are training their sights on mobile game-obsessed millennials

Mobile games are big business, and advertising is turning out to be a major source of revenue for gaming companies. Chinese internet giant Tencent Holdings managed to surpass Facebook in valuation a day after breaking the $500-billion barrier. Mobile and online games are a key part of the business for Tencent, not well known outside China. In India, WestBridge Capital-backed Nazara Technologies, a mobile games company, has had IIFL Special Opportunities Fund acquiring a minority stake for around ₹330 crore.

Nazara Technologies recently teamed up with Pokkt, a smartphone ad platform for mobile games, to develop a campaign for Nazara’s popular game based on the ‘Chhota Bheem’ character. The duo partnered with Reckitt Benckiser’s Dettol. The product was integrated in the game to enhance user experience as well as brand visibility. Bheem washes his hands at regular intervals, to keep germs at bay, aligning with Dettol’s core positioning.

MONETIZING WIN-WIN

“Mobile games like Candy Crush, Temple Run or Angry Birds are passé,” says Rohit Sharma, Founder, Pokkt. “They are free to download and the game developer only makes money when a person buys some coins to go to the next level.”To get the cash registers ringing integrate brands into the games, he says. Most people don’t buy coins and abandon the game altogether. When brands get into the act, they offer incentives that help players get to the next level, and people purchase the brands.

According to market research and advisory firm Gartner, 46 per cent of global app users paid for their apps, and download numbers were 268 billion by the end of 2016, generating $77 billion in revenue. “In-app purchase is huge in America, China and Japan, though it has just started creating some steam here,” says Sharma.

With over 12 million active users, of which eight million are children, the gaming company Nazara decided it was time to reach out to its audience in an innovative manner. Getting rid of the intrusive banner ads, which most players cannot wait to close, Pokkt helped the company integrate several FMCG brands into its mobile games.

Other than Dettol, Pokkt has integrated brands such as Flipkart, Myntra, ITC, Britannia, Boost and Dabur in other mobile games. “We cater to most of the top global games. Some games like Subway Surfers, Temple Run and Angry Birds will never die or go out of fashion, for the publisher will keep on creating updates. Most game developers are keen on introducing content that is sticky and engaging. So the new levels and new interactions are where brands can move in and monetise,” he adds.

Whether it’s placing their names or logos inside the games to catch the attention of the players while using the app, or having them engage with it actively, advertising in gaming has become a preferred choice for brands, says Sharma, adding that a mobile game being a more interactive medium makes for more brand visibility as users are engrossed in the experience.

Reliance Games, a part of Reliance Entertainment - Digital, of the Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group, teamed up with GoPhygital, a Mumbai-based firm, to announce its foray into the fast-growing augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) space.

The duo are to develop games, apps, and experiences. Amit Khanduja, CEO, Reliance Entertainment – Digital states the company will continue to push the boundaries for apps and games with AR and VR. “We are at the threshold of a big revolution in how digital content will be consumed,” he added. GoPhygital is working on an AR-based casual game that leverages Apple’s ARKit technology, to be launched soon by Reliance Games.

POISED FOR BIG GROWTH

Ninad Chhaya, Co-Founder and COO, GoPhygital, added that mobile apps and games have become an integral part of most consumers’ lives. “With mobile devices getting more powerful year after year, mobile games are set to change the gaming landscape,” he said.

Referring to a recent study done by market intelligence company Newzoo, Chhaya said by 2020, games on smartphones and tablets will capture 50 per cent of the global games market. “These stats are incentives for companies to take the leap and start investing and advertising in mobile gaming apps,” he pointed out.

Johnny Li, Vice-President, Cheetah Mobile, APAC and Global Performance Business, says the advent of 4G and surge in smartphone usage has resulted in a boom in mobile advertising. “The market potential, however, is still relatively untapped due to misconceptions about the industry, such as its suitability for businesses beyond apps and performance marketing,” he adds.

Cheetah Mobile is a Chinese mobile internet company with operations in India. This March, Cheetah Mobile rebranded its ad division in India as Cheetah Ads. It works together with major advertisers, developers and publishers. Li noted that ad fraud was another concern globally, “but is something the entire industry is trying to combat. With a localised approach, Cheetah Ads will continue to invest in the emerging mobile ad space in India and make the advertising experience smarter and better for brands as well as for users.”

InMobi, a mobile advertising platform, has similar ideas. Last year, it teamed up with Tapjoy, a company that deals with mobile advertising and app monetisation, to monetise Tapjoy’s inventory in India.

Tapjoy has 40 million unique users in India across popular mobile games such as 8 Ball Pool, Criminal Case, Shadow Fight 2, and Subway Surfers. An official said advertisers will be able to expand their reach beyond InMobi’s 135 million unique devices in India by accessing Tapjoy’s India inventory.

According to a report by Nasscom, mobile game downloads are expected to grow at a CAGR of 58 per cent over the next five years, touching an estimated 5.3 billion downloads in 2020.

Capitalising on this trend and cricket fever is Gamesbond, a mobile games marketplace and a part of Mauj Mobile. With 20 million monthly active users and over 65 million annual downloads, the company launched Sprint Cricket, developed in partnership with SuperSike Games, a Delhi-based game development studio. As mobile game app developers continue to play a crucial role in creating a vibrant market for content, their monetisation strategies focus on new forms of advertising that go beyond the traditional banner ad. “Mobile games have been gaining in popularity due to the advancement in mobile technologies, internet penetration and the large increase in the number of smartphone users,” said the official.

Pokkt’s Sharma says India has emerged as one of the top five countries globally for online mobile gaming, and adds that India’s hypergrowth in game downloads and 30 per cent increase in time spent on mobile games are early indicators that monetisation is set to be the next area of growth.

Last year’s Nasscom Game Developer Conference had also noted that Indian mobile gaming revenues are set to reach $1.1 billion by 2020.

With millions of apps being installed in a single day across all genres, Sharma insists brands would find more value in advertising within the app “as it is more measurable and there are third party tools gaining precedence for in-app advertising, which also helps the brand to get more eyeballs.”

Facebook's new 'Click-to-WhatsApp' ads will start chats with businesses

independent.co.uk
Companies 'can now make it even easier for people to learn about their products, set up an appointment or use their service', the firm says

Facebook and WhatsApp are being tied much closer together.

The social network, which owns the messenger firm, is launching a new "Click-to-WhatsApp" ad unit that’s designed to make users chat to businesses.

WhatsApp is strongly opposed to the idea of placing adverts inside its service, and this move represents a far less intrusive way of monetising the app.

The Click-to-WhatsApp ad unit will sit inside ads on Facebook, and appear as a Send Message button.

Tapping it will instantly open a WhatsApp conversation with the company behind the ad

“Many people already use WhatsApp to communicate with small businesses. It’s a fast, convenient way to stay in touch,” Pancham Gajjar, Facebook’s product marketing manager, told TechCrunch. 

“By adding a click-to-WhatsApp button to Facebook ads, businesses can now make it even easier for people to learn about their products, set up an appointment or use their service.”

(TechCrunch)

Facebook is reportedly rolling out the new feature in North and South America, Africa, Australia and “most of” Asia.

Though it hasn’t explained why Europe isn’t included on the list, this could be related to the incident last year, which resulted in the company having to suspend controversial WhatsApp data-sharing plans, amid privacy concerns from the European Commission.

“Advertising isn't just the disruption of aesthetics, the insults to your intelligence and the interruption of your train of thought,” WhatsApp wrote in 2012, before it was taken over by Facebook. 

“At every company that sells ads, a significant portion of their engineering team spends their day tuning data mining, writing better code to collect all your personal data, upgrading the servers that hold all the data and making sure it's all being logged and collated and sliced and packaged and shipped out... And at the end of the day the result of it all is a slightly different advertising banner in your browser or on your mobile screen.

“Remember, when advertising is involved you the user are the product.”

WhatsApp is also on the verge of launching a completely new app called WhatsApp Business, which will make it easier for companies to keep in touch with customers

Why Net Neutrality Was Repealed and How It Affects You

nytimes.com

The F.C.C. voted to dismantle rules that require internet providers to give consumers equal access to all content online. Here’s how net neutrality works

The Federal Communications Commission voted on Thursday to repeal Obama-era net neutrality rules, which required internet service providers to offer equal access to all web content without charging consumers for higher-quality delivery or giving preferential treatment to certain websites.

The vote is a big win for Ajit Pai, the agency’s chairman, who has long opposed the regulations, saying they impeded innovation. He once said they were based on “hypothetical harms and hysterical prophecies of doom.”

These are the rules that were repealed

The original rules went into effect in 2015 and laid out a regulatory plan that addressed a rapidly changing internet. Under those regulations, broadband service was considered a utility under Title II of the Communications Act, giving the F.C.C. broad power over internet providers. The rules prohibited the following practices:

BLOCKING Internet service providers could not discriminate against any lawful content by blocking websites or apps.

THROTTLING Service providers could not slow the transmission of data based on the nature of the content, as long as it is legal.

PAID PRIORITIZATION Service providers could not create an internet fast lane for companies and consumers who pay premiums, and a slow lane for those who don’t

How it could affect you

Many consumer advocates have argued that if the rules get scrapped, broadband providers will begin selling the internet in bundles, not unlike how cable television is sold today. Want to access Facebook and Twitter? Under a bundling system, getting on those sites could require paying for a premium social media package.

In some countries, internet bundling is already happening. In October, Representative Ro Khanna, Democrat of California, posted a screenshot on Twitter from a Portuguese mobile carrier that showed subscription plans with names like Social, Messaging and Video. He wrote that providers were “starting to split the net.”

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Ro Khanna

✔@RoKhanna

In Portugal, with no net neutrality, internet providers are starting to split the net into packages.

10:04 PM - Oct 26, 2017 

Another major concern is that consumers could suffer from pay-to-play deals. Without rules prohibiting paid prioritization, a fast lane could be occupied by big internet and media companies, as well as affluent households, while everyone else would be left on the slow lane.

Some small business owners have also been concerned these issues will affect them, worrying that industry giants could pay to get an edge, and leave them on an unfair playing field.

“The internet, the speed of it, our entire business revolves around that,” David Callicott, who sells paraffin-free candles on his website, GoodLight, said last month.

E-commerce start-ups, for their part, have feared they could end up on the losing end of paid prioritization, where their websites and services load slower than those run by internet behemoths. Remote workers of all kinds, including freelancers and franchisees working in the so-called gig economy, could similarly face higher costs to do their jobs from home.

The argument against regulation

“It’s basic economics,” Mr. Pai said in a speech at the Newseum in April. “The more heavily you regulate something, the less of it you’re likely to get.”

The F.C.C. chairman has long argued against the rules, pointing out that before they were put into effect in 2015, service providers had not engaged in any of the practices the rules prohibit.

“Did these fast lanes and slow lanes exist? No,” he said in the speech. “It’s almost as if the special interests pushing Title II weren’t trying to solve a real problem but instead looking for an excuse to achieve their longstanding goal of forcing the internet under the federal government’s control.”

Several internet providers have made public pledges in recent months that they will not, block or throttle sites once the rules were repealed. The companies argue that Title II gives the F.C.C. too much control over their business, and that the regulations make it hard to expand their networks.

The internet was already changed

Perhaps the repeal won’t change the direction of the internet. In November, Farhad Manjoo argued that the internet has already been dying a slow death, and that the repeal of net neutrality rules only hastens its demise.

He wrote that the biggest American internet companies — Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and Microsoft — “control much of the online infrastructure, from app stores to operating systems to cloud storage to nearly all of the online ad business.”

Meanwhile, most American homes and smartphones connect to the internet through a “handful of broadband companies — AT&T, Charter, Comcast and Verizon, many of which are also aiming to become content companies, because why not.”