Today in Digital Marketing - Hacking Google Images for the Metaverse

Episode Date: August 9, 2022

Google's outage last night is still causing aftershocks today... Snapchat's figured out how to create 3D models out of 2D photos... A major social media platform lays off 30% of its staff... TikTok is one step closer to competing head-on with Amazon... and you want to edit tweets? Prepare to open up your wallet.Go Premium! No ads, story links in show notes, deep-dive weekend editions, better quality, live event replays, audio chapters, earlier release time, exclusive marketing discounts, and more! Check out https://todayindigital.com/premiumfeedFor information on advertising, our social media, contact info, and everything else, please go to https://todayindigital.com/shownotes➡ Join our Slack at todayindigital.com/slackOur Sponsors:* Check out Kinsta: https://kinsta.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Today, Google's outage last night is causing aftershocks today. Snapchat's figured out how to create 3D models out of 2D photos. A major social media platform lays off 30% of its staff. TikTok is one step closer to competing head-on with Amazon. And you want to edit tweets? All right, prepare to open up your wallet. It's Tuesday, August 9th. I'm Todd Maffin. Here's what you missed today in digital marketing. Yes, Google search was down globally last night.

Although it was put back up fairly quickly, some sites are reporting major issues with search quality and indexing. In other words, you might see ranking changes for your brand's position or swings in traffic. According to searchengineland.com, these issues include old pages dropping out of Google search, new pages not being indexed, search results looking stale and outdated, and in some cases, huge ranking fluctuations. So what happened? According to reports, the outage was caused by a fire in a Google data center,

which also injured some workers. Restoration efforts continue today, and despite the big problems being reported by some sites, Google search advocate John Mueller posted on Twitter saying it didn't seem that big to them. Quoting Mueller, I'm not aware of anything specific, but it does sound like from the news reports it was a bigger outage. If it's related, I'd assume that it'll settle down soonish. Also, I see very few complaints, so I'm guessing, if anything, it's either fixed, almost fixed, or very small, unquote. We checked the search rankings of our clients and did notice some volatility, more than usual. Some up, some down. Hopefully it'll settle soon. Incidentally, Twitter was down today for some people. The company said an internal systems change was to blame. It didn't last long. They have since rolled that update back. In other words, they turned it off and on again. Metaverse. Yesterday, the company behind Snapchat published a new research paper which outlines a process that lets developers create 3D objects from existing videos and images from online

collections. Collections like Google Images. By using Snapchat's new method, images would no longer need to be photographed and rendered in a physical studio, which is one of the most time-consuming and challenging aspects of 3D object capture for developers today. Here's how it will work. AR and VR developers will search for an item online. They select a group of relevant images taken from different angles of the object. Then the system will digitize your object, enabling 3D object creation without scanning. Quoting Snapchat, this ability could unlock the ability for an AR creator or developer to digitize any object in the world as long as there are photos

or videos available of it found in an online image collection. This is a significant step toward the goal of creating a library of AR digital assets to overlay computing on the world. From AR-branded content to branded stickers, Snapchat is testing new product stickers, which, when tapped, direct customers to product listenings. A few months ago, the platform launched an AR shopping feature called Dress Up, which lets users view lens options and virtually try on products from different brands. Now, select Snapchat users have access to dress-up stickers, which lets them add product stickers to their content. The new product stickers are organized by brand,

with clothing and accessory businesses dominating the selection, at least for now. Here's how it works. First, users tap the brand to select specific products. Then users can add the product sticker to their snap. Their viewers can then tap the sticker to learn more about the item or make a purchase. The platform says eventually dress-up stickers will live inside a new hanger icon inside the sticker picker preview after taking a snap. The feature is currently only available to a small number of users. Today, Hootsuite, the social media management platform, announced layoffs affecting 30% of its staff. The Canadian tech company employs about 1,400 people.

The CEO said the move will help the company realign itself to work on growth and financial sustainability. He wouldn't comment any further. This is, of course, related to the economic slowdown. Shopify also announced some weeks back it would lay off 10% of its staff. Quoting the Globe and Mail, many tech companies bulked up in the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, during which billions of people turned to digital services

for many stretches of isolation, driving tech companies into a hiring spree. But now companies are reducing costs at a rapid pace. After years of free-flowing venture capital, an era of macro economic uncertainty has been ushered in by high inflation and rising interest rates. This has left many tech companies fearful of a future with less funding, and executives have begun to shed staff en masse around the world as they try to stretch their existing capital as far as they can. No business or profession is risk-free. Without insurance, your assets are at risk from major financial losses, data breaches, and natural disasters.

Get customized coverage today starting at $19 per month at zensurance.com. Be protected. Be Zen. TikTok has taken another step forward in its push to become a social commerce engine. The platform is testing a new e-commerce tracking hub with select customers. They've added an order center button to some users' profile pages, which tracks products that they have bought, viewed, or might be interested in. Consumers can track all aspects of their TikTok shopping experience by tapping this order center button, including payment details, tagged items, recommendations, and more.

Another day, another story about Twitter getting an edit button. The good news, it's very close to becoming a reality. The bad news, it looks like you'll have to pay for it, at least in the short term. According to screenshots of unreleased code, Twitter may be planning to lure users to, quote, join Twitter Blue to get early access to Edit Tweet.

Twitter Blue is their paid add-on that gives you a handful of other features. The wording of this makes it sound like eventually it might make it into the free product and that this is just going to send the first test group out to their existing paid subscribers. One thing we don't know is whether editing will be supported in the API. After all, most medium and large-sized brands don't post right on the Twitter website. They use a third-party tool like Agorapulse or Sprinklr. Those tools can't do anything if social media platforms like Twitter don't offer that functionality in the API. I can't imagine it wouldn't be in there. But then again, I didn't think they'd consider putting it behind a paywall either. Well, here's a tool that'll be welcomed by social media marketers that you don't have to

pay for. Soon, you might be able to finally schedule all of your Instagram content directly through the Instagram mobile app. The platform is reportedly developing a native post scheduling process, which will let brands and social marketers schedule all of their content from the app, including reels, images and stories. The tool will let you schedule content between 20 minutes and 75 days in advance. This, at least according to the early screenshots we've seen. This option has been available in Business Hub for some time. Creative Studio. Creative Hub.

Is it Business Suite? Creative Suite? Creative Hub? Or Creator Studio? Nobody knows. And finally today, brands on Pinterest can now link their boards

in IdeaPins, which are the platform's stories formats with a new board sticker option. Here's how it works. You access the feature from the sticker tray within the IdeaPin creation process. Tap on board sticker to choose from your existing boards. Once your board is selected, you can add it to your frame. Creators can add up to five board stickers per page and 20 board stickers maximum in an idea pin sequence. You can also tag any public board that you own. So how does it benefit you? Well, it's a pretty easy way to make your board more

visible, especially if it's part of a brand collaboration. Currently, the tool is only available to select iOS users. I gave it a good shot. I gave it 20 hours of a good shot. Assassin's Creed, Valhalla. Just not my thing. I loved the one before it. I loved it. Odyssey. My wife loves Valhalla.

I tried twice. Two 20-hour playthroughs. I couldn't do it. So I have settled on Fallout 76. Again, I love the Fallout series. But I've been watching the Discord channel. It looks like it's been down for maintenance. This is just the week for things being down, eh? Apparently all day

even all the Twitch streamers are just sitting around on a blank screen. So maybe that's what I'll be doing tonight. See you tomorrow. Bye.