/sm/ - Social Media

insta just dropped another guide that's basically just common sense. they're pushing 3-minute clips for "storytelling" now but i doubt anyone actually sits through that in a feed. it mentions using text overlays and captions together for accessibility, which is fine, but the real meat would be actual data on reach. they also pointed out those slideshows from still images again. seems like they're just trying to keep people from leaving for tiktok with these tiny feature updates. i don't see how 180 seconds of video helps our engagement metrics if it's not viral actually interesting.

https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/instagram-shares-reels-creation-tips-in-new-guide/831551/

been looking at these updated formulas for tiktok and youtube and it's such a headache. everything changes every time someone updates an api or something. specifically the way they want you to calculate it for linkedin vs instagram feels totally inconsistent.
>the correct current formulas for each
it's not even like we're all using the same metrics anymore. if you're trying to track x alongside facebook, the math doesn't even line up. i tried running a quick check on some old data and the numbers just look wrong. it's basically just different math for every single app at this point. honestly feels like we're all just guessing with these different denominator options anyway. if you're not counting shares as part of the total, you're losing half the story. at least that's what i tell my clients are you guys still using the same spreadsheet for all your platforms?

https://blog-cms.socialinsider.io/how-to-calculate-engagement-rate/

testing 14 different schedulers just to see if they break at 100+ posts a month is such a grind lol. most of them fall apart the second you actually need a client to approve something or add an extra manager to the workflow. honestly, i don't care about all the fancy features if the approval loop still requires manual emails and spreadsheets.

i'm sticking to my messy manual way for now

link: https://planable.io/blog/schedule-social-media-posts/

$12.5 billion lost to fraud last year is actually insane. seeing all this talk about deepfakes and AI phishing makes me want to just delete everything and go back to print.
>impersonation of your brand can carry a direct cost to your customers is such a nightmare for anyone trying to maintain a clean visual identity. even the way they suggest using Hootsuite Social OS feels so heavyweight bloated.

article: https://blog.hootsuite.com/social-media-security/

i was just looking at this scrollEd thing and it's honestly so cursed. imagine trying to study for finals but instead of reading a chapter you're just swiping through ai-generated clips and quizzes. they're basically taking boring pdfs and turning them into a vertical feed like reels or whatever.
>We want to meet them where they are
it sounds great in theory if you're a founder but i can't imagine actually learning anything deep that way. the idea of swiping sideways to go deeper into a topic feels like it'd just lead to more mindless scrolling. ngl it's basically just turning education into more brain rot content. they even want to sell engagement reports back to schools. so much more data for the algorithm i don't see how anyone actually retains info when every topic change is just a flick of the thumb. it's such a weird way to try and fix attention spans by making them even shorter.

article: https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/20/scrolled-wants-to-turn-textbooks-into-tiktok/

Still seeing so many teams only tracking their own channels instead of looking at the open web. It's pretty much a guarantee that someone is complaining on Reddit or some review site without ever tagging the brand.
>Monitoring runs at the mention level.
If you aren't checking for keyword matches across forums, your sentiment data is basically fake news. I don't know how anyone expects to catch a crisis when they're ignoring everything except their own notifications.

found this here: https://planable.io/blog/social-media-monitoring/

I'm not so sure about this idea of 150 different skills in one Claude project. It sounds like a nightmare to manage without some massive drift or just plain confusion between the folders. I'd need to see how it handles long-term consistency before I'd trust it to write anything more than a simple hook.

more here: https://www.agorapulse.com/blog/ai-social-playbook/e6/

another guide telling me to benchmark competitors and use tools for strategy. it's all just basic stuff like checking engagement or picking a dashboard, nothing new. i already know how to read a graph anyone actually finding value in these deep dives lately?

full read: https://blog-cms.socialinsider.io/social-media-analytics-guide/

meta is actually trying to hold tiktok and youtube hostage with this deal. they're basically saying if those guys don't cough up billions or agree to things like disabling nighttime notifications by default, meta gets a huge discount on their own fine. it's such a transparent way to force the industry into one standard without actually having any real power.
>If TikTok and YouTube don't make the changes and pay up, Meta gets to knock $5 billion off its settlement.
it's wild how they're using the states as a weapon against their competitors. it's not even about kid safety at this point, it's just pure corporate maneuvering. if youtube doesn't play along, does everyone just lose?

found this here: https://www.theverge.com/policy/985556/meta-settlement-youtube-tiktok-snap

tiktok's us arm is finally jumping into lantern with everyone else. they're even dropping 2 million for that ncmec cybertipline upgrade. >"cut manual processing times in half" lmao as if sharing signals between meta and tiktok actually does anything. it's just more corporate theater to look like they care.

link: https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/22/tiktoks-us-arm-joins-lantern-a-cross-platform-child-safety-initiative/