songbird ombudsman: Instagram Responds to Privacy Policy Backlash, and Other

Instagram Responds to Privacy Policy Backlash, and Other Marketing Stories of the Week

Cozy Christmas Cat Happy Holidays, marketers! :-)

Are you enjoying your cozy, festive weekend with family and friends?

We know many of you are off having a jolly ol' time rockin' around the Christmas tree, but we also don't want you to fall behind on your marketing news of the week! That's why we compiled this list of stories you definitely shouldn't miss (especially if you're diligently planning for a killer 2013 when you return from your holiday vacation).

So Come All Ye Bloggers!?It's time to deck the halls with the top marketing stories of the week.

Instagram Updates Privacy Policy, Begins Sharing Data With Facebook, From Marketing Land

This week, Instagram updated its privacy policy, officially allowing Facebook to share information with Instagram, and vice versa. The original changes would have allowed Instagram to ?share user content and your information? including data such as location, cookies, devices, and more with Facebook owned companies. Of course, Instagram saw some serious backlash about this ?share user content and your information? piece, because it implied that Instagram might take users' photos, use them in ads, and not pay users for using them. Basically, it sounded as if Instagram's plan was to start a stock photography service using any and all photos on its platform. Users spoke, and it turns out that Instagram listened.

Shortly after the update, Instagram decided to make nice with its revised terms of service and roll back many of the original advertising policies Instagram had set in place. These new terms will take effect on January 19, 2013. As a marketer, make sure you?re paying attention to Instagram?s new updates regarding advertising and its connection with Facebook. This will come in handy to you once it rolls out to everyone! Click here to read the full story.

Twitter Passes 200 Million Monthly Active Users, a 42% Increase Over 9 Months, From TechCrunch

You might remember Twitter?s last update back in March where the microblogging service announced its 140 million active users milestone, with 340 million tweets per day. This week, Twitter announced (through a tweet!) that the service now has more than 200 million monthly active users and 400 million tweets per day. Wow! A 60 million user increase in 8 months, and a 42% increase in the size of its active user base in under a year? Not bad! So what does this mean for your marketing? Don?t overlook Twitter as a way to attract customers to your business! The platform is consistently growing and improving its features to suit the needs of its users, staying in the game as one of the best social media tools in the world. In fact, Twitter also rolled out another new feature this week -- the ability to download an arvhive of all your tweets. Interested in learning more? Read the full story from TechCrunch here.

Facebook Now Includes Business Pages in Local Mobile Search Results

Uh oh. It seems like Google might have some new competition when it comes to local search! Facebook is finally getting savvy about optimizing for mobile users on the go. This week, the network announced updates to the 'Nearby' tab within its mobile app. These updates provide local businesses with an even better opportunity to get discovered by Facebook mobile users.?

Now, users will not only see which of their friends have checked in at specific places, but they'll also be able to discover places and businesses that are nearby (kind of like Foursquare, huh?). Search results are very socially driven, ranked primarily by the recommendations of the particular user's friends, as well as star ratings, check-ins, and Likes. And what happens if there are no recommendations from the user's network? Result rankings will default to the general Facebook community?s engagement with that business or place overall. For more information on Facebook?s update, read the full story here.

We're About to Start Seeing Video Ads on Facebook, From Business Insider

Get this: Facebook is gearing up to launch a new video ad product for advertisers, which, like most new Facebook ads, will appear in a user?s News Feed. Want to know a little bit more about the ads? Well, they will appear on both desktop and mobile versions of Facebook, and they will start playing automatically instead of requiring the user to click on the video to watch it (which is how Facebook video ads exist today).

You might be picturing full-blown TV commercials popping up with loud noises all over your feed. But don't jump to conclusions just yet. Facebook has yet to decide if the audio component will play automatically along with the video component. Facebook will launch its new video ad product by April 2013 at the latest, so keep an eye out! What do you think of this new advertising concept on Facebook? Will you use it in your marketing? Read the full story here to learn more.

The Business Blog Editorial Calendar Every Marketer Needs

Savvy business bloggers know that consistent, frequent blogging is critical to online marketing success. Knowing that 70% of companies that publish articles 2-3 times per week have acquired a customer through their blog and also that companies that increase blogging from 3-5X/month to 6-8X/month almost double their leads, it's not difficult to understand why frequency is so important. So how do you turn your company blog into a thought leadership-building, lead generating machine so you can achieve similar success?

Organization and planning is more pivotal to business blogging success than you might think. That's why we launched our newest template offer this week, the Blog Editorial Calendar. Download this template to stay organized, monitor your keyword use and topic balance, and manage your blog's timing and deadlines. Our template is designed to keep you on track as you develop awesome content that your prospects, customers, and readers will all love. Get your free template here.

Google?s Product Listing Ads: The Aftermath, From Search Engine Land

When searching for holiday gifts on Google, we can all easily identify which placements are paid and which are organic. But have you ever noticed that, within Google?s Shopping section, there is no clear notification that results are paid placements? Hmm ? very sneaky. The only way you?ll know is if you click on the link in the right hand corner that says, ?Why these products?? where you?ll receive an explanation that says, ?Products and offers that match your query. Google is compensated by these merchants.?

This is an interesting change to the way Google places ads, but the biggest change in Product Listing Ads on Google Shopping seems to be the absence of Amazon from the listings. Search Engine Land points out, ?If you search long and hard enough, you will find some Amazon listings in the results but only at a fraction of the company?s former visibility.? What do you think of this update to Google?s advertising function? Click here to read the full story and analysis of Google?s Product Listing Ads.

Happy holidays, from HubSpot!

Image credit:?fletcherjcm