The current pandemic made many businesses start offering their products or services online which only surged the need for digital marketing skills in the Middle East. Dubai-based platform We Speak Digital was launched to support those who want to enter the digital marketing field or for entrepreneurs who need digital marketing to support their business.  

We Speak Digital offers practical courses as well as live coaching from digital marketing experts. Users are able to build their own learning path and the system recommends courses according to the user’s level. 

Incubated in in5, We Speak Digital aims to improve the level of digital education in the market. “We want to use our experience with digital marketing in the Middle East to help others in their career or business. Especially at these times we believe remote education and practical skills is something many can benefit from,” said Lukas Krejca, CEO of We Speak Digital. 

The platform works on membership basis and every user can decide whether to enroll in one of the video courses, get certified or to schedule a coaching session with We Speak Digital trainer. “In many companies, there is a lack of knowledge about digital marketing. And especially now, when many traditional businesses had to shift to online for the first time. Digital marketers in such companies often don’t have anyone who would support them with experience or knowledge. That’s when our coaching sessions will come in hand. We Speak Digital is like Netflix, just instead of watching movies or series, you will learn something new that can help you in your career,” added Krejca.

He currently works with a  group of industry experts on new courses such as Digital Marketing Fundamentals, Google Ads or Content Marketing & SEO. “There are many people who want to start their digital marketing career or entrepreneurs who would like to run online campaigns for their business but can not afford the service from the best experts in the market. We want to make it possible for them and unlock the best digital marketing knowledge to everyone who is keen to learn.”

 A new type of product tagging that is currently under testing enables Instagram Business profiles to tag products in post captions. This is an exciting feature that provides Instagram users with a new way to see your products.

Business Instagram profiles will soon have the possibility to tag products in post captions in addition to tagging products in photos, videos and stories. This gives your audience an extra opportunity to shop.

Once they tap, people will see richer descriptions, who have shared the product, additional imagery and related items from your shop.

It appears that you can tag a product both on a photo/video post in addition to tagging it in the caption of the same post.

By tagging your Instagram posts, you help potential shoppers browse, discover, and buy directly from your Instagram Business Profile. 

Tagging your products in the Instagram post caption is currently under testing but if you are looking for a way to create shoppable Instagram posts, be sure to check out our detailed guide!

Facebook Blueprint helps those interested to learn about Facebook marketing and thus support the growth of companies. Therefore, every marketer or company in whose marketing strategy Facebook has its place should know it. Vikas Wadhwani, Head of Certifications and Assessments, Facebook Business Education, gave us an exclusive interview about the possibilities of online courses and certifications.

Q: What is the Blueprint and it can help advertisers?

Facebook Blueprint is a portfolio of skills and training offerings from Facebook that supports advertisers that want to grow their businesses, students and job seekers who want to grow in their careers, and educators and non-profits that want to help others. Facebook Blueprint provides: free online lessons, in-person and virtual training, advanced-level certifications, and answers to frequently asked Facebook advertising questions.  

Q: What are the differences between Certification and free online courses?

Facebook Blueprint’s online courses are quick, free and available to everyone. These modules cover a range of topics, covering aspects of advertising on our platform – from creating a Facebook page for the first time to advanced targeting and measurement techniques. 

Facebook Blueprint Certification is the highest level of accreditation that Facebook provides and recognizes. Becoming Blueprint certified helps people distinguish themselves as highly credible in their knowledge of Facebook products and services. The exams are high stakes exams that are psychometrically sound, are developed using legally defensible methods, and are delivered through a third party. They are available on the market for a cost. Once a user passes a certification exam, Facebook recognizes that the user has an advanced level of knowledge of our platform. 

Blueprint Certification enables certified professionals to signal to clients and employers that they have advanced-level skills and allows businesses to identify top talent that can support their marketing goals.

Q: What should I choose – Certification or online course? What are the types of certifications?

Anyone interested in gaining more knowledge about advertising on our platform can start with our online courses that are available for free. 

From there, we have multiple certifications that we currently offer. Depending on where you are in your learning journey, you may want to pursue an entry-level certification like our Facebook certified “Digital Marketing Associate”. You can also pursue more advanced certifications, like Facebook “Media Buying Certification” and “Media Planning Certification”. We also have technical certifications for developers that cover topics such as Facebook Pixel, SDK and Facebook API. We also now have a new advanced certification for Marketing Science, suitable for people in the Measurement field, such as data analysts. 

We recommend starting with our online courses and once you are familiar with the topics that we cover on the certifications, you can take advantage of the free practice tests available on our website. You can take a practice test to gauge your existing knowledge, and if you do well on the practice test, then you are more likely to do well on the exam. If you don’t score well on the practice test, the diagnostic feedback we offer will point you to online course topics on which you should focus. Depending on what type of certification you want to pursue, we also have study guides available on our website. 

Q: In which languages are the Certification and online courses offered in?

At this moment, our certifications are available in English and up to 9 other languages. We continue to monitor the demand from each market and analyze when we should be translating in certain languages. 

Q: How can I register for the Certification and what is needed? How much does it cost?

To register for an exam, visit the Facebook Blueprint website and select the certification exam that you want to register for. From there, go to the Certification Hub and follow the step-by-step instructions.

The exam can be taken in multiple formats. There is an in-person testing format where you can sign up for the exam, schedule an appointment and go to the test center run by a third party partner. We also have an online testing format where you can schedule a supervised exam and take it from either your home or office in a private setting. Finally, we have in-office testing which is through Facebook invitation only. 

Costs vary depending on the level of certification and markets.You can view a full pricing list, by market, on the testing partner Pearson VUE’s website. 

Q: For how long is the certification valid for and how can I renew it?

The Associate level certification is valid for 2 years from the day you get certified. After 2 years, you can renew your certification by re-taking the exam. Advanced level “Buying” and “Planning” certifications are valid for 1 year. You can renew these certifications at the end of first year by re-taking the exam. Our “certification refresh” option allows you to go through an online e-learning experience followed by a short assessment. This option, which is free of charge, is available online based on eligibility. If you are eligible, you can re-certify 6 months prior to expiration of your initial certification. Note: every alternate year you have to go through the exam experience to keep up with your certification. Developer certifications are valid for a period of 18 months and have variable requirements because there is an exam and a coding exercise. 

Q: What is Blueprint Live? How can one attend such an event?

Blueprint Live is our in-person training conducted by trainers on the Facebook Blueprint team. This program is closely aligned with the learning objectives we have for our certifications. It is invitation-only and conducted at Facebook offices. If you are part of an agency that works with Facebook, you may receive an invitation from Facebook to attend Blueprint Live training whether or not you plan to get certified immediately.

Q: Why would you encourage people to get certified? What is the benefit of the certification?

The biggest advantage for you as an individual to get certified is that you can use this credential to differentiate yourself in the marketplace. If you have one of our Facebook Blueprint certifications, you will be awarded a digital badge that you can apply to your resume, your LinkedIn profile, email signature and other surfaces. Publishing your badge allows others who are seeking experts on Facebook family of apps and services to find you. 

Facebook certification proves your high-level proficiency and expertise on Facebook’s products and platforms. In many cases, certified individuals use the credential similarly to how they might use a degree from a college or university. For example, an individual can use certification when interviewing for roles in digital marketing, or to position themselves for a promotion or other career advancement opportunities. 

If you work in an agency and you get certified, your agency can refer to your certification as a form of expertise to potential and existing clients. When working with clients, your certification can provide them with confidence that you are spending their advertising budget in a meaningful way and giving them maximum return on their investments.

I am sure that many of us have often been in this situation; You spent hours choosing magnificent creatives, writing irresistible copy, defining carefully your target audience and finally submitting your perfect ads for review. Unfortunately, it ends up with you receiving a notification that says that your ads have not been approved. Facebook rejects them for violating its policies. But what are those policies? Let’s take a closer look at them.

My ads have been in review forever!

Unfortunately, Facebook doesn’t publicly clarify how exactly the approval process works behind the scenes. But based on what we know it’s likely a mix of algorithmic and manual analysis. 

When you create ads on Facebook, they’ll be subject to a review process to see if they comply with Advertising Policies or not. Facebook will check the ad’s images, texts, audience and positioning, and even the content of your ad’s landing page.

You can check the current status of your ad in the “Delivery” column in Ads Manager. 

The ad review process begins as soon as you finish creating your ad and submit it for publishing. Typically, most ads are reviewed within 24 hours, although in some cases it may take longer. Such examples could be busy periods, such as Black Friday or Christmas. Therefore, it is better to prepare your ads in advance, set your campaign launch on a future date and have your ad approved in the meantime.

If you’ve been waiting too long for an ad to be approved, try to duplicate the ad. The approval process will start from the beginning. It usually works well but if not, you have to contact the Facebook support team.

How do I know that my ad has been approved?

After your ad is reviewed, you’ll receive a notification from Facebook. If your ad is approved, they will start running your ad and you can see your results in the Ads Manager. 

But don’t celebrate too soon. It happens sometimes, that an approved ad can get disapproved 24 hours later. At first, your ad might have been approved by the “algorithm”, but then someone reviewed it manually and rejected it.

Because there is no shame in not knowing, the shame lies in not finding out, check these most common reasons why your ads being rejected:

You’re advertising something prohibited

Facebook has a detailed list of “prohibited content”. Don’t try to get around it. Too many rejected ads might raise red flags on your Facebook advertising account.

Here are a few things that aren’t allowed:

• Tobacco and Related Products – Ads must not promote the sale or use of tobacco products including electronic cigarettes or vaporizers.

• Adult products – Ads cannot focus on sexual pleasure or sexual enhancement.

• Mention on personal Attributes – Ads must not contain content that asserts or implies personal attributes about a person’s race, religion, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, financial status, name and others (examples of correct wording could be found here).

• Non-Functional Landing Page – Your ad may not be approved if the landing page content isn’t fully functional or doesn’t match the product/service promoted in your ad. This may also include cases when you are directing people to landing pages that are PDF or JPEG files or pages that automatically download files to a person’s computer.

• Grammar & Profanity – Ads must not contain bad grammar and punctuation. Symbols, numbers and letters must be used properly without the intention of circumventing the ad review process or other enforcement systems.

“  Buy Now ♔ ♕ ♚” would not work for Facebook. Use “Click here for more information!” instead.

• Personal Health – Before-and-after images to promote weight loss that contain unexpected or unlikely results.

• Payday or advance cash loan services – Ads which intend to cover someone’s expenses until their next payday.

• Multilevel Marketing – You cannot promote business models offering quick compensation for little investment, including multilevel marketing opportunities.

• Community Standards – Facebook’s policies about ensuring safety, security, and protecting intellectual property and personal information. It means no nudity, hate speech, violence. Another big one is bullying and harassment.

• Fake buttons – Non-existent functionality on ad images, such as play buttons, notification jewels or checkboxes. Facebook knows how to recognize it.

You can find a full list here.

You’re advertising something restricted

Alcohol, dating services, real money gambling, financial and insurance services state lotteries or cryptocurrency products. All these items and even more must comply with applicable laws and regulations, which do vary from country to country.

Examples:

• If you promote alcohol in Saudi Arabia which is illegal in the country, your ad is going right in the digital trash bin.
• If you provide cosmetic surgeries and procedures and you are trying to target 16-year-old girls, Facebook crackdown immediately.

Services only allowed with prior written permission from Facebook

Dating, real money gambling and games, online pharmacies, cryptocurrency products and services, drug and alcohol addiction treatment. Promoting these categories could be very challenging. In order to help prevent misleading advertising, Facebook requires prior authorization.

If the subject of your business falls into this restricted category, but you still believe that Facebook might be the right marketing platform for you, you have to get your ad account whitelisted by Facebook. 

It is quite a demanding process when your application is being examined by a special team on Facebook. We’ve been through this many times. If you need some assistance, contact us via our contact form. 

You’ve made a mistake with your ad creative

Excessive text in ad images may result in your ad reaching fewer people or not running at all. Remember that text on ad creatives mustn’t take up more than 20%. Use this Facebook tool to check your image. If you get a rating “ok”, you are fine. If you have a worse rating, do not use this image and try to find a better one.

What to do if your ad got already rejected

It will happen to everyone at some point. Facebook guidelines may seem overwhelming and it is difficult to check everything at once. In this case, you have 2 options:

1. Edit your ad

If you have a clear idea of what Facebook doesn’t like about your ad, you may be able to edit your ad and fix the issue. Once you save your changes, your ad will be resubmitted for review again. 

2. Appeal the decision

If you can’t edit your ad or feel that the decision not to approve the ad was a mistake, you can appeal the decision using this form. Another option is the “request review” button in the ad edit tab.

3. Contact the support team via the chat

If you are not satisfied with the result of your review and would like to contact a Facebook representative, take an opportunity to join a chat on Facebook Business help center.

Tip for you: Set your Facebook interface to English. Support team members often require print screens from the Business Manager and they must be in English. Make communication with them easier and get ready for it.

Are your ads approved but are not delivering? Check out our troubleshooting guide to spot ad delivery problems.

Recently, the number of online video calls has been growing significantly. Facebook is responding to this situation by introducing the Messenger desktop application, which will enable group video chats on a computer. You can use the application for home and business conversations.

In the last month, Facebook has seen a more than 100% increase in the use of audio and video calls made through Messenger in a desktop browser. Therefore, they are launching an application for MacOS and Windows that will offer unlimited and free group video calls.

What’s most interesting about this application?

• Calls can be made on a widescreen.
• You can connect with others easily.
• You can do more activities at once.
• You can receive notifications.
• Calls are synchronized on both desktop and mobile.
• Everything you love about Messenger, you’ll have it on the bigger screen (including Dark Mode and GIFs)

More details about the new feature can be found on the Facebook blog.

Have you been looking forward to being able to respond to messages from the desktop version of Instagram? After a year of testing, Instagram is now introducing the feature nationwide!

Instagram began integrating Direct Message into the desktop version of the application last February. In January this year, it made this option available only to selected users, as the feature was still in trial mode.

If you want to check if you already have access to direct messages, all you have to do is log into your Instagram account from your computer via the website www.instagram.com. After logging in, you should see a paper plane symbol at the top of the panel. If you do not have the new option yet, just wait; Instagram will gradually introduce it to all users.

Instagram is mainly a mobile application, but for many companies that own corporate Instagram accounts, it is more convenient to operate them from a computer. This slight update can mean greater work efficiency for you. Responding to messages will be faster, clearer

Here is a summary of recent news from Facebook and its other platforms related to the current coronavirus pandemic. Posts and events that encourage protests against quarantine measures will be deleted by Facebook. WhatsApp is developing new stickers to reinforce a number of health recommendations. And Instagram is introducing new procedures for memorializing accounts in the event of death.

Posts in protest of quarantine measures

Facebook will remove posts and events that support violating regulations meant to combat the coronavirus pandemic. In addition, Facebook is working with experts to develop new rules for assessing whether content goes against the government regulations of each particular state. Facebook will be able to intervene by deleting content according to these rules.

Facebook launches new ‘Care’ response

After several weeks of testing, Facebook will start introducing a new emoji with a heart-hugging face to its platform, including to Messenger. The reaction is meant to expresses solidarity and being close to other users during the COVID-19 pandemic.

WhatsApp is collaborating with WHO on new “Together at home” stickers

WhatsApp will introduce a new set of stickers to help spread important health news among its users. It is intended to strengthen the basic rules of conduct and hygiene, such as hand washing and social distancing. WhatsApp also states that because people communicate with stickers a lot and send billions a day in their application, they want to bring them some fun during the quarantine period.

Memorialization tools for Instagram accounts

Tragically, the current global situation has brought with it the deaths of some users of this platform. Facebook has offered extensive help for these situations. Instagram is now also dealing with the issue of death and is developing new tools on how to proceed in such cases.

Facebook is testing the interconnection between company loyalty programs and their customers on the platform.

Facebook has recently launched a new pilot program that effectively links a user’s brand loyalty activities to their Facebook account. This functionality will allow the brand to create ads with Custom Audiences who have signed up for their loyalty program.

These ads will have a Link Account button at the bottom of the new CTA. When a user clicks on it, their Facebook account will be linked to the brand loyalty account.

Once connected, members will be able to track their loyalty account status directly on Facebook. They will also be able to earn points for activity on social media and for online shopping, as well as membership discounts on purchases.

The new tool is currently being tested in the US, but it is already clear that it will help businesses better motivate customers to make repeat purchases, target ads more effectively (based on past or offline purchasing behavior), and create specialized, exclusive events for members only.

Especially if you are interested in sports and healthy diet, you may have already faced the problem of choosing the right food supplements that reliably support your body, yet don’t taste artificial. The same dilemma kept bothering the then 16 years old young man, Daniel Sosyn, who was hopelessly seeking a brand which still tastes good even after 2 servings.

Since he didn’t find any such brand, he decided to create his own product with the goal to make them taste so great that people actually look forward to another portion. He tested an uncountable number of variations and then finally in 2015, he perfected the formula and started selling the first protein-based food supplement. Shortly after, they launched an e-shop Proteinaco.cz and it proved to be the best way for getting the products in the hands of the customers.

“We’ve started as total greenhorns in the area of ecommerce. Untouched by online marketing, we knew absolutely nothing about data analytics. Thanks to the focus on product quality and our customers, we managed to grow the annual turnovers in the range of millions of CZK. But then we reached the point when the business wouldn’t grow any further. The typical strategy to simply throw more money into online marketing and then observing the results kept resulting in more problems than profit”,

as Daniel Sosýn recalls the break-through in his business.

It immediately became clear to Daniel that to grow the company further, he needs to focus on quantifiable metrics that reliably measure return on Protein&Co.’s investments, and he needed to build an integrated strategic business plan based on what the data say. He searched for a satisfactory solution but had not found any for a long time, until he came across a presentation by Milan Merglevky about utilizing predictive analytics for management and optimization of marketing investments. 

After only a few days, Milan and Daniel met together, discussed the possibilities, and agreed that Milan will help Protein&Co with their data management.

Milan already had vast experience with such processes, which he gained through collaboration with
several other e-commerce clients. So together with his colleague Marek Kobulský, they transformed their experience with investments management and digital marketing into MarketingIntelligence.io, which became the core for the management of marketing investments also for Proteinaco.cz

The first necessary step was to identify the differentiation of Protein&Co, which itself was not that complicated thanks to Protein&Co’s unique original offering and due to Daniel’s focus on customers and product quality.

3 key steps lead to success of new e-shops

At first, it is crucial to determine specific goals, devise a business plan for monthly progress, and identify the key metrics, along with the point of positive return on marketing investments. These ensure that from the economic perspective, the business model as a whole is feasible and profitable. 

Secondly, when the right KPIs and budgets were decided, a structure of marketing investments had to be designed and the ideal volume of investments per specific marketing activities was identified. 

Lastly, the segmentation, audience creation for specific marketing platforms and bidding strategy has been optimised and automatized based on the available data. For example, one of the most important aspects was the automatization of retention campaigns based on the calculations of customer lifetime value, which allowed for showing the right online advertisements to the right customers in the right time.

Once the fundamental* business plan was completed, advanced data management was enabled and soon after took the form of various campaign experiments for individual marketing channels, which aimed to test the channel’s contribution and potential.

This testing allowed Protein&Co to adjust their strategy and their predictive modelling so that the marketing investments are used as effectively as possible. This, for example, led to revealing the hidden potential of Facebook, further testing of increased budgets for the given channels, and clarification of the channels’ impact on the other platforms used as well as the overall profit. This was a significant progress for Protein&Co as the complex process of attribution modelling typically prevents companies from exact measuring of profitability, even in the world of “reliable” digital metrics.

Results

Thanks to the management of the whole process, including project management and the management of the internal communications, Protein&Co was able to keep the whole project profitable and in fact, exceed the planned annual 30% growth by 20% already after the first month from implementation. That allowed Proten&Co. to save finances, which now may be allocated to development of new products, salary increases, or any other area to help grow the company.   

”If you want to take your online project to a whole new level, I can sincerely recommend you Milan Merglevsky and his project MarketingIntelligence.io”,

Daniel Sosyn, Protein&Co.

* Although a business plan that is based on data and is connected to marketing activities should be the foundation for any e-shop that wants to grow, even some larger e-shops still do not have such a business plan in place.

Do you like 3D images, but don’t have a smartphone that can create them? Facebook has come out with a new feature that will convert any static 2D image into a 3D photo simulation.

So far, sharing 3D photos on Facebook has been very limited. You had to have a higher-end smartphone. However, Facebook has decided to make the 3D format accessible to everyone by applying AI platform environment technology, which can create a 3D image from any 2D image.

If you want to try the feature, make sure you have the latest version of the Facebook application installed on your mobile phone. Then click on What’s on your mind in the feed and select the 3D photo option. Facebook redirects you to your photo gallery, where you select the image you want to convert to 3D. Then the whole transformation process, which only takes a few seconds, begins.

The result is a post in a 3D simulation:

This is not a 100% 3D photo, but a modeling that creates a 3D effect when the phone is moved.

It is better to use full-fledged 3D images for marketing purposes, but if you have no other choice, you can try this transformation as well.

If you are a manager of Facebook communities, you know very well that managing groups and managing a large number of users is far from easy. Facebook is aware of this fact and is, therefore, launching a new Community Accelerator program. It will offer course participants guidance and training on how to make the most of all the tools available to help grow their communities.

Community Accelerator is a six-month program for community managers. The first three months are focused on courses and trainings led by experts. At this stage, participants should learn how to create a plan for expanding the community. The second part of the course will deal putting the plan into practice, again with the support of specialists. Facebook will also provide select managers with certain funds.

If you qualify, you can apply for the program. The age limit is 18 years and is mainly geared towards users from the following countries: Brazil, USA, Australia, Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, United Kingdom, France, Germany, South Africa, Kenya, Nigeria, and Egypt. Your community must also have existed for more than one year and must have a minimum of 5,000 members.

If you do not qualify for the program, you can at least look at the details of a similar training that took place in 2019, where Facebook was supported by 115 community administrators around the world.

If you are interested in community building news, you can visit the Community Building Center or Facebook Groups. You will quickly learn about other upcoming community leadership programs.

As the coronavirus situation continues, the buying behavior of users is changing. Businesses must keep pace with all this and adjust their processes to avoid losing customers or revenue. Facebook is trying to help businesses and has published two new guides that can guide them on how to survive the crisis.

The current situation has more or less affected all fields. During this period, comprehensive information, as well as financial support of companies that need it, has been very valuable. Facebook recently launched its Resource Center and established a grant program to provide both.

Facebook also recommends that as with all activities moved online, businesses should not forget about social networking and should make the most of it. In addition, they have published a guide with tips and recommendations on how to communicate during the coronavirus crisis.

Now Facebook has gone a step further and has released two new handbooks for:

• Retail advertisers and
• E-commerce advertisers.

Both manuals provide practical guidance on how to stay safe and protect yourself, your employees and customers, and how to deal with communications, processes, and other business operations—all through Facebook tools and options.

The recommendations in the manuals can be applied across disciplines and organizations. Facebook also recommends using alternative channels and trying tips on how to handle the current situation best while minimizing losses.

Did you know that you can emerge from the crisis as a stronger and more popular brand? First of all, you need to manage crisis management and avoid these frequent mistakes, which are listed below. Every crisis brings new challenges to manage, we must start from the most important one and avoid these mistakes. As a result, your customers will appreciate you even more.

Act in a timely manner

Do not ignore the situation or delay acknowledgement of a crisis. If you pretend everything’s normal, the matter will only get worse. You run the risk that all your customers will know about the crisis from other sources without you telling them. There will be distrust, from which it will be very hard to get back from. We recommend including social media, PR messages, sending out an explanatory email to contacts from your database. Show that you know about the problem, solve it and do everything possible to fix it.

Make decisions quickly 

Mastering time-management during a crisis is essential! Organizations should outline in their plans how they will make decisions. This also includes determining the time for the necessary approvals to ensure your organization can respond as quickly as the public needs in order to remain in control of your message—and safeguard your reputation.

Do not ignore Social Media

The likelihood of your crisis playing out on social media is high. You should be the one who informs the public about your current situation and be 100% transparent. Social media is the place where your customers are. It doesn’t matter if you are in B2B or B2C business. Most people follow social media and if you handle the situation well, you can increase your value in their eyes. 

Prepare a weekly post plan to prepare each post to make sure you don’t repeat and each post has a clearly defined goal.

Don’t just rely on organic reach and fans of your site. Reach out to your site visitors who are not Facebook fans but know you and buy from you.

Be in touch with the affected customers 

Don´t be the company that gets lost in the shadow of bad news. You have to show you are honest and trustworthy even in the hard times. It can deepen the relationship with your customers. Show empathy and understanding. Tell them that you care about them and that you will do anything to cope with the crisis and continue to serve you. Every word matters.

Prepare for the crisis

Failing in not being ready for the crisis can worsen the overall impact. A good crisis communications plan should be always ready to use. Without planning and training the right people in your company, you can put the invested years of building your company to danger. 

It is important to have a plan ready, assign roles to your team members during the crisis, as well as a set time window in which you have to decide on a daily basis so that you do not waste precious time.

It is necessary to have a plan for crisis communication. How will your company comment on it and how will society perceive it?

This can be ensured by a well-developed strategy that spans all your marketing channels where you are active and prepares a unified plan to inform the customers and keep the situation firmly under control.

This will show whether you will come out from the crisis as winners or losers.

Do you feel that your crisis management is not properly managed or prepared for an unexpected crisis? Let us know what challenges you face and we will be happy to help you. 

Demand for some Facebook services is currently growing. These include the increased use of messaging, video calling and live broadcasting. The number of people watching live broadcasts has increased by as much as 70% since January. That’s why Facebook has decided to improve some of its tools to make it easier for users and businesses to connect.

The live capabilities offered by Facebook Live are used by many companies to communicate with customers. Increased viewing of live broadcasts is also logical, as people are at home more during quarantine and spend a lot of time on social media. Therefore, Facebook has developed several improvements for Facebook Live.

Standard Users

Users will now be able to see automatic subtitles and will also be able to choose to listen only to the audio of the video. This saves a lot of data and does not compromise the content of the stream. The introduction of the option to listen to video audio moves Facebook Live closer to podcasts.

Anyone can watch the live broadcast, including people who do not have a Facebook account or are not currently logged in. This maximizes the potential for live stream traffic.

Another development includes functions for charity and fundraising. In live broadcasts, it will be possible to generate a toll-free telephone number that followers will be able to call to contribute to good causes.

Facebook is also making changes to the Stars System to help musicians and cultural institutions raise funds through Facebook Live.

Facebook Groups Administrators

Facebook has created a new Live Producer tool for page admins and streamers. It is a control panel for managing live broadcasts, through which broadcasts can also be scheduled. At the top are the important Stream Setup, Questions, Stream Health and Polls functions. Live Producer also handles camera settings, audio devices and connecting live broadcasts to third-party applications.

Comment management and moderation also have improved features, where you can choose from the following settings:

Furthermore, Facebook will allow you to create a 60-second clip from the live broadcast, which will then be shared and promoted.

There will also be an update to graphic elements, as it will be possible, for example, to display questions and comments of viewers directly in the stream. The speaker will then be able to respond to them live.

Share Instagram live stream to Facebook

Instagram has also started testing a new option to share live streams to Facebook. It would work by streaming one broadcast on both platforms at the same time. If Instagram introduces this feature, you will be able to get a lot more viewers for your live streams.

It will be possible to watch the Instagram live stream on the web

Another new feature that we can look forward to in connection with live broadcasting on Instagram is the possibility of displaying it on desktop computers. Facebook is responding to the increased interest in live streams during the pandemic and wants people to have an even better experience. Another benefit will be a separate live URL that you can easily share with other channels.

Also check out our article on how to use the live stream on Instagram during the coronavirus period.

Facebook has begun providing location data to health authorities to help monitor human movements and the spread of COVID-19. Facebook also developed a set of tools for groups to better share important information about the pandemic through their communities. In addition, Facebook is working on new ways to help small businesses overcome these difficult times.

COVID-19 and location tracking

Facebook has begun providing health authorities with a range of location data. The blue lines represent data from mobile phones and indicate user movement. The more lines, the more people travelling between areas, creating a higher risk of infection. Facebook is also generating other similar maps for the authorities, which help them with their research.

COVID-19 and new tools for groups

The first new feature for pandemic-related groups is a pop-up window that directs group members to the official COVID-19 information centre on Facebook. There, users can learn information from relevant organizations.

The second piece of news is that Facebook will encourage administrators of COVID-19 groups to share live official health broadcasts to their communities.

Facebook is also preparing new Education units for groups. The aim is for users to learn important information and understand the increased risks associated with COVID-19 through training modules added to groups. In this way, Facebook wants to use the huge potential of communities to inform its users.

COVID-19 and support for small businesses

In addition to their grant program, Facebook will provide small businesses in the United States with a digital gift card tool through which people will be able to support companies during this difficult pandemic.

In addition, a business owner can create a personal charity fundraiser for their business on Facebook and ask loyal customers for support.

Facebook will also allow pages to adjust their temporary change of services in connection with the pandemic. Just go to Settings and the Page Info section.

Facebook is now launching its Community Help tool in the Czech Republic as well. Thanks to this, users will be able to ask for help or provide help to friends and acquaintances. Fundraising campaigns can also be organized through Community Help.

The COVID-19 outbreak is negatively affecting many local businesses across the world. Some have been even forced to close their doors. Some of them may not even reopen again. However, there are still many loyal customers out there who now crave for the simply irresistible cakes they used to buy or the exciting yoga lessons they used to attend. This article focuses on such loyal customers, and especially on how to make it easy for them to connect with you in these difficult times!

What is the greatest challenge businesses face these days? Perhaps you would not be surprised that the biggest pain point is the significant drop in demand, and thus the sales. In fact, a Goldman Sachs survey shows that 51% of U.S. small business owners said that their business would be able to continue operations only for the next 0-3 months under such conditions. ¹

On the other hand, some small businesses have rather experienced an increase in their sales as they are lucky to be operating in areas which have been seeing increased demand in general. For example, food and healthcare businesses stand a much better chance of surviving the crisis.²

Regardless of your business area, however, the support of your local customers seems to be an important factor that can determine, whether your business survives or not.

Let’s sum it up. Customers crave for your services or products but unfortunately, we are all social distancing. It’s time for you to mix your marketing strategy up!

If your local community is willing to support your business, it is then wise to inspire and encourage your local customers to do so through any of the following 10 proven concepts.

Offer vouchers and gift cards

You can let your customers prepay your service to be enjoyed “later once this crisis is over”. Incentivize them by adding an additional percentage to all vouchers purchased.

One of the ways of implementation would be adding the “Gift Card” tab to your Facebook page. You can easily do so in Facebook Developer’s Account.

Start with your own delivery

You can use external food delivery services from other providers such as UberEats, AmazonFresh, DoorDash, Grubhub. 

Or you might use Facebook, Instagram or Whatsapp and let people order via these apps. They can place their orders by sending a message to you. 

Use Instagram and Instagram Stories

Instagram is introducing new ways for people to support businesses.

You can share links to your offerings through a “Gift Card” or “Food Orders” Stories stickers or add a “Gift Cards”, “Order Food”, or “Donate” button to your Instagram profile. If you are interested in all the possibilities Instagram now offers, you can check them out here on the Instagram blog.

Update your Facebook Page

Tell your customers about temporary service changes and update this info easily on your Facebook Page. Businesses can change the way they operate: fitness studios can offer virtual classes or restaurants can offer delivery instead of a dine-in service. You can learn here how to best keep your Facebook fans updated.

Find influencers

Find influencers who are relevant to your industry and whose audience penetrate your ideal audience segment.

If you are looking for branded content partnerships on Facebook, you should also consider influencer marketing platforms such as Brand Collabs Manager, an easy way to get matched with potential influencers.

Advertise your products on Facebook and Instagram

This is an essential way to expand your reach on social platforms. Facebook and Instagram have a wealth of information about their users. You can benefit from this by targeting just the people who are most likely to become your customers.

Enable online order on your Facebook Page

Besides standard tabs like “About”, “Events” and “Photos” you can add custom page tabs via the Facebook platform which will be loading content directly from your website. That way, users will be able to easily click on “Start Order” to begin the ordering process.

Note: Only pages with 2000+ likes can create the custom page tabs.

Add a Shop to a Facebook Page

You can let people shop right on Facebook by adding a Shop section to your Facebook page. You can use this section to list products you’re selling and connect with more customers on Facebook.

Implementation tips: Each product needs to be uploaded individually. There’s no limit to the number of products you can add. But remember that you can only sell tangible products.

Start with Instagram shopping

You can show your products on Instagram through your organic posts and Stories, or have people discover your products in Search & Explore. When someone taps a product tag on your post or a product sticker in your story, they’ll be taken to a product description page.

Cooperate with others in your location 

Find a partner in crime. Check crowdfunding platforms to support local businesses and their workers, keep afloat through gift card purchases. Examples of such platforms are helpmainstreet.com or saveourfaves.org. 

You can also be active in local Facebook groups in your location. Offer your services there. Follow initiatives that arise on Facebook and make yourself as visible on social media as possible

Should you prefer to have a team of experts taking care of your social media advertising, there is nothing easier than getting in touch with Business Factory via our CONTACT FORM.

In recent months, Facebook has introduced many changes to the process of using Messenger for Business. Based on these changes, we have prepared a list of tips to help companies apply the new features to their business. All of the updates have one thing in common – they were all made to improve the communication experience for customers.

1. Answer quickly and set a response time

Facebook has confirmed that users expect quick responses from companies. Therefore, it is very important that you set a response time before which your customers will receive the required information.

2. Write short and concise messages

Facebook users prefer short messages. You can split long texts into several shorter messages. The beginning of the message should be concise, as the user will already see it in the preview. And it goes without saying that every answer should be correct.

3. Use an option to send messages outside the standard window

One of the biggest changes is the removal of the 24 + 1 Answer Rule. You can now use other options:

• Messenger tags – Send personalized, non-promotional messages, such as account updates, purchase information or event information.
• One-time notification – The page can ask the user to send one more notification message after the 24-hour messaging window ends.
• Sponsored Messages – These allow you to send offers and updates to users you are connected with through Messenger.

4. Focus on high-value messages for the customer

Facebook recommends that the communication be clear, factual and of high value to the customer. This applies in particular to notifications sent outside the standard window. Your communications should not be annoying or unsolicited, as the user may block you.

5.  Give users a choice

Consider giving your audience more control over the type of content they receive from you through Messenger. For example, you can allow a user to choose specific types of alerts. As a result,  they will only receive information that they are really interested in.

With these recommendations, Facebook wants to streamline communication between businesses and their customers through Messenger.

Facebook has updated their Advanced Mobile Measurement Terms and Conditions, which prohibit advertisers running mobile campaigns from receiving device-level (or post-view) data. This allows advertisers to measure campaign performance only on an aggregate and anonymous basis.

This update, which has been in effect since January 22, highlights Facebook’s efforts to protect user data while sending an important message to advertisers.

Previously, device-level data was available through Advanced Mobile Measurement. This gave advertisers and their partners access to raw data – including device-level hashed IDs, but without the information that personally identifies users. This data could then be used for more detailed targeting and ad tracking.

Because of this change, advertisers can no longer use device-level data to:

• Target or retarget ads
• Redirect tags
• Sell to third parties
• Inform advertising campaigns across channels

Whether and how much this change will impact advertisers is not yet clear. However, we should pay attention to those who run campaigns on mobile devices and rely on device-level data to target and optimize.

Bonus: Tips on how to use the Facebook grant to cover implementation costs at the end of the article.

Marketers typically adjust their online campaigns based on the results that have been achieved with the campaigns’ so far. What if the marketers adjusted the campaigns based on the future results of the running campaigns instead? If it sounds like black magic to you, read on and learn about the the predictive analytics and the benefits of such an approach to your campaigns.

The story of Peter, who optimises his campaigns the old way

Peter is the marketing director of an online retailer selling winter clothes. For this month, Peter’s budget for marketing campaigns is 30.000 USD and his objective is to generate revenues of 200.000 USD.

Being highly experienced in campaign management, Peter splits the budget amongst various campaigns and channels based on his best educated guesses. As expected, the first results come in a few days after launching the campaigns, and so the team adjust the campaigns based on the campaigns’ previous performance. And then they wait for another couple of days.

After a week, Peter finds out that not all of the channels contribute to reaching desired business goals. Thinking that it is caused by only a few days of campaign running as they are still one week in the month, nobody pays attention to this. Just to make sure, however, Peter tells his team to increase investments in website traffic generation, hoping that it will increase sales.

The time of the next meeting comes, and Peter starts being concerned. The website traffic has increased but it led to no increase in sales. The generated revenue was only 70.000 USD, ¾ of the budget are already gone, and there are only two more weeks left until the end the month. So the whole team agrees to create a new strategy and refocus on that one in the execution.

Now, Peter is awaiting some good news very soon, but they are not coming!

When it comes to the end of the month, the results are to be presented to the rest of the company. Yet, Peter knows that the 110.000 USD in revenue is less than satisfactory and furthermore, almost all of the budget has now been used, there is only 5.000 USD left. It would take a miracle to deliver the planned results as delivering 200.000 USD is now simply impossible.

The story of Peter, who uses insights from future for his decision-making

If only Peter could go back in time and make the decisions again, now with knowing the end result. Well, let’s try it now. The company stays the same. The marketing team is the same. Also it is the same Peter. However, now they all have access to information about their campaign results at the end of the month, and even quarter.

Of course, Peter now splits the budget amongst various campaigns and channels based on their potential to increase revenues at the lowest possible cost per customer. The team now launches and observes the campaign the same way as before and a few days in, the results come in as usual and they can still see that not all campaigns and channels do as great as they could.

This time, however, Peter knows exactly what is happening. He knows exactly what is works and what doesn’t, and more importantly, he knows how individual campaigns and channels contribute to reaching the set business goals.

So Peter agrees with the team to invest more in the most effective channels and take the money away from the low performing ones. This time, the change is not yet another attempt but rather a data-driven decision. Moreover, the data have been calculated by machine learning algorithms and represent the future results.

Technology allows for what used to be dreams to come true

“We can see that predictive models can reach high precision rates.For example in terms of customer lifetime value evolution, our systems generate forecasts with a mere ± 5 % margin error,” says Milan Merglevsky, one of the founders of Marketing Intelligence.io

The technology of Marketing Intelligence is built on mathematical and scientific basis and utilises machine learning technology. However, the ease of implementation may indeed seem like a fairytale or magic.

Predictive analytics during Covid-19

Neither the best mathematical model or technology can predict such a global crisis that the outbreak of Covid-19 is (at least yet). However, such a technology can adapt to the new situation quicker than any human can, and so the technology would identify the changed situation in a matter of few days and would consider the new market conditions in its future predictions.

This is one of the reasons why Facebook created an initiative reacting to the covid-19 outbreak, which aims to support a limited number of selected companies in their transformation to data-driven marketing. With this initiative, Facebook makes it easier for companies to become competitive in the data-driven era by covering a significant part of the implementation costs, and thus accelerates the transformation of the whole market. The eligibility requirements and an easy way of applying for the grant can be found on this page.

Are you a Pinterest fan? If yes, read on. Facebook and its experimental NPE team are launching a new application called Hobbi that is similar in style and use to Pinterest. You can collect images of hobbies or interests and sort them into boards.

NPE ( stands for New Product Experimentation )is a Facebook team, and its task is to develop customer-centric applications. This is precisely the goal of the new Hobbi application. It is designed to help users document things they love so they can come back to them and keep them in mind.

Hobbi can be used for projects and hobbies, focused mainly on hobbies as cooking, arts, crafts, fitness, decoration and the like. You can save individual photos into categories/boards and share the results of your work with other people in the community. In addition, you create a “diary” and monitor your progress. In addition to photos, you can create videos in Hobbi and share them with your connections.

The Hobbi application is still in its infancy and it is unclear whether Facebook will support it for commercial use over time. It is currently only available in the US Apple Store, but will soon be introduced to all countries.

Other NPE creations include Whale, Aux and Bumb.