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You can now create Instagram Ads without a Facebook Ad Account Connection

After a long time since it was first announced that Facebook is planning to let Instagram users advertise easier for their businesses, Instagram will now let businesses run ads on Instagram without connecting to a Facebook ad account.

Starting today, you will no longer have to go through the hard ad time-consuming process of connecting your Instagram to Facebook to be able to create Instagram ads. That is a huge change which makes thing much easier for business owners and marketers.

As officially announced by Facebook today on their latest help center blog post, You can now create Instagram ads without having a presence on Facebook. If you are promoting a post from your Instagram business account for the first time, you won’t have to connect to a Facebook ad account or Facebook Page.

At this time, you can’t connect your Instagram account to a Facebook ad account. You’ll be able to manage your ad campaign and track ad performance on Instagram. You won’t need to manage your Instagram ads on Facebook Ads Manager.

Note: Even If you don’t connect your Facebook ad account to your Instagram account, you can still create and use a Facebook ad account. Your Facebook ad account will remain separate from your Instagram account. You’ll be able to view and manage all Facebook ad campaigns on your Facebook ad account. Meanwhile, you can view and manage all your Instagram campaigns on your Instagram account.

Who can exactly create Instagram ads without connecting to Facebook?

The ability to create Instagram ads without a Facebook ad account connection is limited to businesses that are promoting their Instagram posts for the first time. If you’ve already promoted posts on Instagram, you’ve likely already linked your Instagram and Facebook accounts. You won’t experience any changes when promoting your Instagram posts or stories.

How to promote an Instagram post without a Facebook ad account connection?

From now on, easily create ads on Instagram and promote posts without a Facebook connection. To manage the promotions and view analytics and check insights, all you have to do is to head to the Instagram app and, from there, easily keep track of your promotions.

Follow the steps below to promote an Instagram post without a Facebook ad account:

Go to your profile.
Tap the post you’d like to promote.
Below the post’s image, tap Promote.
Fill in the details of your promotion by setting things like Destination (where to send people), Audience (who you want to reach), Budget (how much you want to spend daily), and Duration (how long you want your promotion to run). Tap Next once you’ve completed these details.
To complete your promotion, tap Create Promotion under Review.
Once you’ve tapped Create Promotion, your promotion will be reviewed to ensure it meets ad policies. Promotions are generally reviewed in 60 minutes, but in some instances, the review process may take longer. Your promotion will begin running after it’s been reviewed and approved.

TikTok has ‘multiple paths’ to stay alive in the US

As President Trump has ordered, TikTok has to shut down the app after 90 days from the order, which was Aug. 14th, and by that time, TikTok must be bought by one of the companies such as Microsoft which showed interest in buying TikTok.

Trump said TikTok would have to “close down” in the US. Yet, the general manager of TikTok’s business in the US Vanessa Pappas has told Bloomberg that the app will continue to operate in the country regardless of the potential ban.

“We believe we have multiple paths forward to ensure that we continue to provide this amazing app experience to the millions of Americans who come to rely on it every day,” Pappas told Bloomberg. Pappas also oversees TikTok’s business in Canada, New Zealand, and Australia.

As Engadget has reported, TikTok has fought against claims that it could be forced to hand over data to the Chinese government, saying it has an American CEO and that it doesn’t take orders from China. Meanwhile, Microsoft confirmed that it had begun discussions with TikTok’s Chinese owner ByteDance to acquire the US operations, and Oracle is reportedly in similar talks as well. After all these controversies and issues, it does not seem like TikTok is going to go anywhere, whether it’s through an acquisition by a major American company or dogged persistence on the part of TikTok’s US employees, it appears the app won’t be leaving the country anytime soon. We shall wait and watch to see what would be the future of this popular app and which company is going to win its acquisition.

Facebook is making it easier for users to find Black-owned businesses nearby

Facebook has added another useful feature to show support for black communities on the platform. Facebook is making it easier for users to find Black-owned businesses on its platform. The new feature is part of the company’s ongoing initiative, announced in June that aims to aid Black communities.

Facebook has clarified about the update on an official blog as below:

“Black-owned businesses have faced systemic barriers for generations – and the huge amount of interest we received from these businesses has confirmed just how enormous the challenges they continue to face really are. That is why we doubled down on investing in and building tools to help this community.”

How does the “Black-owned business” feature work?

This feature would be available to the admins of Black-owned businesses, and they can now self-identify, and these businesses would be shown in a subsection among the Facebook businesses nearby.

There is no badge or label that will be displayed to represent these types of businesses on Facebook. Instead, this will allow a business to appear in the “Black-owned Businesses” subsection located in the “Business Nearby” tab. The tech giant is also allowing minority-owned businesses to identify their listings, too.

Putting this feature aside, Facebook has thought of a new thing for the black communities again. Facebook also announced that it is allocating $40 million to grants provided to small Black businesses.

Black-owned businesses with up to 50 employees can apply for this grant money, and the company will select 10,000 Black-owned businesses to award the funds. In June, Facebook pledged to invest $200 million to support Black-owned businesses and organizations — half of that fund was invested in small Black-owned businesses, creators, and nonprofits working with Black communities, and the remaining half was for suppliers.

Instagram Rolls Out Suggested Posts at the End of Your Following Feed

From now on, your main Instagram feeds would have a new option, “Suggested Posts”. Instagram has now officially added a new listing of suggested posts at the end of your main feed, for whenever you scroll through all of the latest updates from the people and profiles that you’re following.

“Suggested Posts” are from the accounts that you do not follow, and the option would appear at the end of your main feed after you’ve finished all of the new posts from the accounts you have followed and have literally reached the “You are all caught up” notice. Up until now, the feed has been entirely determined by users’ preferences and the people they follow.

As explained in more details by Instagram:

“Our goal is to make it clear when you’re all caught up so you can decide how you want to best use your time. We see people continuing to seek out more posts they’re interested in after catching up with their feeds, so we wanted to learn from that and make it easier to go a little deeper for those who choose to do so.”

According to The Verge, the suggested posts won’t be the same ones that show up in Explore. They’ll be related to the content that people already follow, whereas Explore aims to point people toward adjacent content, says Julian Gutman, head of product at Instagram Home. He used space content, which he follows and engages with on his feed regularly, as an example. A suggested post might be a new space photo from someone he doesn’t follow, whereas his Explore page might contain posts related to physics more broadly.

I personally think this is a very great option for the people who do not have lots of followings, and their new posts on the feed would soon come to an end. After the rollout of this feature, they’ll get to see so many other new and relevant posts and keep enjoying their Instagram.

Google Chrome will warn you when you are about to type into risky text boxes

Google is planning to do something about secure-looking HTTPS websites which can house insecure HTTP forms for you to fill in your passwords and other personal data.

Coming this October, Chrome 86 will protect against HTTP forms on HTTPS sites. As announced on an official Chrome blog post, beginning in M86, Chrome will warn users when they try to complete forms on secure (HTTPS) pages that are submitted insecurely. These “mixed forms” (forms on HTTPS sites that do not submit on HTTPS) are a risk to users’ security and privacy. Information submitted on these forms can be visible to eavesdroppers, allowing malicious parties to read or change sensitive form data.

How will this feature work and stops you from typing into risky text boxes?

Specifically, Chrome will be making the following changes to communicate the risks associated with mixed form submission:

Autofill will be disabled in mixed forms.

Note: On mixed forms with login and password prompts, Chrome’s password manager will continue to work. Chrome’s password manager helps users input unique passwords, and it is safer to use unique passwords, even on forms that are submitted insecurely than to reuse passwords.

When a user begins filling out a mixed form, they will see warning text alerting them that the form is not secure.

If a user tries to submit a mixed form, they will see a full-page warning alerting them of the potential risk and confirming if they’d like to submit anyway.

Google has also previously tried to alert users to this issue by removing the lock icon when it detected an HTTP form, but the company says, “Users found this experience unclear, and it did not effectively communicate the risks associated with submitting data in insecure forms.”

Telegram launches one-on-one video calls on iOS and Android

Telegram has announced that its video calling feature is now available for both ios and Android on its 7th anniversary. The latest alpha version enables all users to access the video calling feature. The one-on-one video calling feature can be accessed by all users through PlayStore or App Store. If it is not immediately available, users should update the app to see the feature.

How to video call on Telegram?

As Telegram has described in their latest blog post, there are a few easy steps to take in order to start video calling on the platform.

Tap the profile page of the person you want to connect with. Users are able to switch video on or off at any time during a call, and the video calls support picture-in-picture mode, so users can continue scrolling through the app if that call gets boring. Video calls will have end-to-end-encryption, Telegram’s blog posts states, one of the app’s defining features for its audio calls and texting.

Users have to follow these steps to make a call on Telegram:

Open the Telegram app.
Go to the profile page or click on the three lines on the left-hand side.
Click on the Calls option from a left-hand side window.
Choose the contact with which call has to be made.
Once the call is active, users can switch to the video mode.

“Our apps for Android and iOS have reproducible builds, so anyone can verify encryption and confirm that their app uses the exact same open-source code that we publish with each update,” according to the post.

Video calls will receive more features and improvements in future versions, as Telegram works toward launching group video calls in the coming months. But for this midyear milestone, you can now enjoy a little one-on-one time with those closest to you, whether they’re in the other room or on another continent.

TikTok Provides an Overview of its Analytics Tools

TikTok is losing its popularity since the latest ios update alerted users that TikTok was copying their clipboard, and many users have complained about the way it spies on their data and information or snoops on the data they have on other applications.

After that, countries such as India started banning TikTok, and now the US is even considering banning the app. These controversies and issues have made, so many users to boycott the ap and quit using it entirely. But for those who are still using TikTok and do not give a damn about these matters, I have some good news.

For those who are looking to maximize their TikTok presence, TikTok has this week published some new pointers on how to make the best use of its analytics tools, which are available on TikTok Pro accounts.

How to get TikTok analytics tools?

As I mentioned above, in order to access the new TikTok analytics options, you first need to switch to a pro-TikTok account. Follow the steps below to convert your account to a professional one:

From your profile page, open the Privacy and Settings tab
Choose “Manage My Account”
Tap “Switch to Pro Account”

From there, you need to select the category for your pro account – ‘Creator’ or ‘Business.’ You then enter the topic category for your profile, and any additional details as requested (mostly basic), and that’s it – you now have a TikTok Pro account.

Now that you are done, and your account is a TikTok pro account, you can access the TikTok analytics section as below:

“Once you’ve switched, you’ll find your analytics in the “Pro Account” page of your settings. On a desktop, you can access the Analytics page by hovering over your profile photo in the upper-right corner of your screen and clicking “View Analytics.” You can also download and export your Analytics directly to your computer when you access TikTok from your desktop device.”

The Social Media Today website later clarified the TikTok analytics options in more detail, which are brought to you below. Keep reading to find out everything about the metrics on TikTok analytics.

There are three elements to TikTok analytics:

Overview – The Overview section provides a general summary of your account’s performance over time. “You’ll see the total number of times your videos were viewed, the number of users who follow your account, and the number of times your profile was viewed.”

Content – Here, you can see a listing of your uploads from the past seven days, in order of newest to oldest videos. You can also see videos that are trending on your account. “These are the top nine videos with the fastest growth in view numbers over the past seven days.”

Followers – And the last tab is ‘Followers,’ which displays your follower count over time so you can view trends in audience growth. You can also access an overview of total likes, comments, and shares that your videos have received.

As with all social platforms, TikTok’s analytics data provides guidance as to how you can improve your performance and maximize your content efforts.

Facebook begins merging Instagram and Messenger chats

The hottest news of the day is out now. Facebook has started merging Facebook and Instagram chats.

From now on, the chats of Facebook messenger and Instagram are merged, and you’ll most probably see a pop-up informing you about this update as soon as you open Instagram.

Most of you must have noticed this update’s pop-up till now which says “There’s a New Way to Message on Instagram” with a list of features including a “new colorful look for your chats,” more emoji reactions, swipe-to-reply, and the big one: “chat with friends who use Facebook.”

What will change after the merge of Facebook and Instagram chats?

There will surely be a few differences after this new Instagram update, and as soon as your chats are merged. A thing to note is that the update is for both iOS and Android devices.

According to The Verge, once you hit update, the regular DM icon in the top right of Instagram is replaced by the Facebook Messenger logo. Chats on Instagram are indeed more colorful than before, with the sender’s messages shifting between blue and purple as you scroll. However, at least for right now, it’s still not possible to message Facebook users from Instagram.

But Facebook has made clear its plans to unify the messaging platforms of its hugely popular apps to allow cross-messaging among Messenger, Instagram, and WhatsApp. Facebook was said to be rebuilding the underlying infrastructure so users who were on only one of its apps could connect to others using different Facebook apps. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has also said he wants the system to be end-to-end encrypted. By integrating its most popular apps, Facebook may be able to compete more directly with Apple’s iMessage.

And also, in another step to integrate its family of apps that are being used by 3.14 billion users globally, Facebook has also integrated Messenger rooms with WhatsApp on the Web.

Facebook adds advanced group analytics

Facebook messenger has added another useful and interesting update for Facebook group admins, which makes group management a lot easier. In The messenger update, there is a new post-level analytics option that will provide more context as to how people are engaging with group updates.

Facebook has explained the more about the feature officially by sharing the below statement:

“With post-level metrics, admins can easily see the reach of a post with the unique number of people who’ve seen the post as well as engagement by reactions, comments, shares, and clicks. Each post also shows the number of active members in the group at the time of post, a key driver of reach and engagement.”

Some of the metrics are the ones that have previously been enabled, but some of them are new and make things much more convenient. For example, options such as reactions, comments, and shares are all displayed on each post and are not new in this update. The main additions are things like photo views, post hides, and active members, which, as Facebook notes, could help to focus your engagement strategies.

Who is considered an “active” group member regarding this update?

Facebook has a fixed definition for determining who is called an “active” member on a messenger group, which is “A member is considered active at the time of post if they have viewed group content in the group or in News Feed in the past 28 days.”

So it’s not people who were actively engaging in the group at the time you posted, its people who’ve been active over the last month.

The very well-known social media expert, Matt Navara, has shared this news with us today, telling us that this feature is finally officially rolled out today, but not all users have access to it yet.

Facebook says that the option will initially be tested with a small number of groups, on all devices, over the next few months.

Note that only posts created after this feature begins testing in your group will show these insights.

Twitter Rolls Out Tweet Reply Controls to All Users

You can limit who replies to your tweets from now on. Now you can have a little more control over who shows up in your mentions.

Twitter has been testing this feature for months, and it today finally announced that its new tweet reply control options are being made available to all users on iOS, Android, and twitter.com. Keep up with me to get to know how this feature works and how to use it to manage your tweet replies for good.

Here is how the feature works:

Starting today, A small globe icon will start to appear at the bottom of your tweet, and if you do nothing, everyone will still be able to reply — this is the default option. Or, you can tap it and limit replies just to those who follow you; or just to those who you tag in the tweet itself. As Twitter has clarified more about the new feature, it works as explained below:

Before you Tweet, choose who can reply with three options:

1) Everyone (standard Twitter, and the default setting).

2) Only people you follow.

3) Only people you mention.

Tweets with the latter two settings will be labeled, and the reply icon will be grayed out for people who can’t reply. People who can’t reply will still be able to view, Retweet, Retweet with Comment, share, and like these Tweets.”

As it seems, the test has been very good, and users have shown that they liked the feature so much. Users in the test pool have said that they feel more comfortable tweeting, and more protected from spam and abuse, which has lead to them tweeting longer, more in-depth thoughts, particularly on sensitive subjects.

But there is another concern, which is that by limiting who can respond to tweets, politicians and brands will theoretically be able to silence opposing viewpoints, which could make their statements appear more accepted than they actually are.