Summer is coming to an end, that means Daylight Savings will be coming to an end (April 5th to be exact) and the year is in full swing. As usual, we have the latest updates in the world of social media right here for you in one place. Topics include, the best time to post on social media channels, as well as some awesome new updates on Instagram for brands, and we shed some light on this Dark Mode craze.
Best Time to Post
Social media scheduling dashboard Sprout Social released some valuable data on the best times to post gathered from their database of over 20,000. It looks like Wednesday mornings are the overall winner and Friday is also a strong day for engagement. Of course, your optimal posting times may vary depending on a number of factors specific to your business or brand but these serve as a great starting point.
Instagram’s New Tools for Businesses
Your Instagram insights now allow you to see which posts are generating more followers as well as give you an aggregated view into follower changes by day or week. Brands will be able to easily gather valuable insights from this data.
Instagram is giving brands the ability to control who can see their profile with age gating. Brands can set a minimmum age on their profile, this can be set for specific countries as well. This will come in handy with brands that need to abide by laws that vary from country to country.
A brand can now decide whether or not they want to display their contact information and category label at any time. Without these brands can rid Instagram pages from any unwanted distractions and keep their followers’ eyes on the prize.
A secondary inbox has been added so now messages will be filtered by Primary and General helping brands stay organised and move between messages with a single swipe. Community management is an important part of nurturing customer journies and relationships.
You most likely would have noticed this new feature already. Instagram is making it easy for users to see what Instagram stories they are tagged in with an icon that shows up almost like its own story at the top of your activity page. This will stop tagged stories from getting lost in amongst your messages - a helpful feature for users who get large amounts of messages.
Going to the Dark Side
Facebook has officially released Dark Mode for Whatsapp, but are there real benefits? It is meant to help with eye strain especially when using your phone in dark places or at night but there are some arguments for the contrary saying Dark Mode can actually cause more strain in eyes in bright conditions and when reading long pieces of content. Other benefits including saving energy and reducing blue light. It is up to user preference in the end and many users do prefer it as Dark Mode has become one of the most requested app updates.
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