It has been an absolutely huge month in digital marketing with Screaming Frog’s new ways to fix a website with Google URL Inspection API, Microsoft Ads’ Dynamic Descriptions for Dynamic Search Ads, Facebook Reels in Australia, Bing’s AIOSEO IndexNow Integration, Pinterest AR ‘Try On’ furniture feature and more.
ICYMI, here’s what happened in digital marketing in February.
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- Pinterest Rolls Out AR ‘Try On’ Feature For Furniture Items
- Microsoft Advertising Portfolio Bid Strategies And Automated Integration With Google Tag Manager
- Microsoft Bing Adds Automobile Search Features
- Screaming Frog Adds Seven New Ways To Fix A Website With Google’s URL Inspection API
- Twitter Expands Test of Downvotes on Tweet Replies
- Yelp For Business Adds Keyword Boosting Options
- Bing News PubHub Moves To Bing Webmaster Tools
- Instagram Adds ‘Your Activity’ Display With Improved Content Management Tools
- Microsoft Advertising Launches Cruise Ads
- LinkedIn Rolls Out Sales Navigator Search
- Meta Drops “News” From Facebook’s News Feed
- Twitter Now Lets You Pin Up To 6 DM Conversations
- Meta Announces New Restrictions on the Creation and Use of Profile Image Frames
- Twitter Adds Labels To Identify Automated Accounts As “Good Bots”
- Microsoft Ads Launches Dynamic Descriptions For Dynamic Search Ads
- Microsoft Advertising Launched Auto-Apply Recommendations
- Meta launches Facebook Reels in Australia
- Bing All In One SEO And IndexNow Integration
Pinterest Rolls Out AR ‘Try On’ Feature For Furniture Items
Pinterest has launched an in-app augmented reality (AR) for home decor called “Try On for Home Decor”, which enables Pinners to virtually place items to see what furniture looks like in their homes before they buy it.
Microsoft Advertising Portfolio Bid Strategies And Automated Integration With Google Tag Manager
Microsoft Advertising announced Portfolio bid strategies are now available globally. Portfolio bid strategies automatically adjust bidding across multiple campaigns to balance under- and over-performing campaigns that share the same bidding strategy (like maximize conversions, target CPA, target impression share, etc).
Microsoft Advertising’s automated integration with Google Tag Manager (GTM) is also now generally available, where you can future-proof your campaigns with the power of UET across your website. To do so, sign in to Google and select the Google Tag Manager account and container via Microsoft Advertising online. Next, enable the permissions to update your setup, and Microsoft Advertising will set up the UET tag with additional parameters.
Microsoft Bing Adds Automobile Search Features
Powered through MSN Autos Marketplace listings, Microsoft Bing now has new automobile search features to enable people searching to find the ideal car. Consumers can search for a specific car, with filters that drill down to features, options, and budgets.
There are links to the MSN Autos marketplace in the knowledge panels for these car-related searches under “learn more” and “shop used cars” right above the car specifications.
Screaming Frog Adds Seven New Ways To Fix A Website With Google URL Inspection API
Google URL Inspection API permits Screaming Frog to incorporate seven new filters that identify website problems in need of attention. The new update also patches a log4j vulnerability issue, adds new keyboard shortcuts, and fixes some bugs to make it more stable.
Seven New Auditing Filters for Google URL Inspection API:
- URL Is Not on Google – The URL is not indexed by Google and won’t appear in the search results. This filter can include non-indexable URLs (such as those that are ‘noindex’) as well as Indexable URLs that are able to be indexed. It’s a catch all filter for anything not on Google according to the API.
- Indexable URL Not Indexed – Indexable URLs found in the crawl that are not indexed by Google and won’t appear in the search results. This can include URLs that are unknown to Google, or those that have been discovered but not indexed, and more.
- URL is on Google, But Has Issues – The URL has been indexed and can appear in Google Search results, but there are some problems with mobile usability, AMP or Rich results that might mean it doesn’t appear in an optimal way.
- User-Declared Canonical Not Selected – Google has chosen to index a different URL to the one declared by the user in the HTML.
- Page Is Not Mobile Friendly – The page has issues on mobile devices.
- AMP URL Is Invalid – The AMP has an error that will prevent it from being indexed.
- Rich Result Invalid – The URL has an error with one or more rich result enhancements that will prevent the rich result from showing in the Google search results.
Related reading: Google URL Inspection API launched
Twitter Expands Test of Downvotes on Tweet Replies
Twitter has announced that it’s expanding its test of ‘downvotes‘ on tweet replies, with more users on both iOS and Android set to see the new down arrow on tweet responses, providing another way to signal your thoughts on each comment.
The downvotes also aren’t on general tweets, just replies, which does reduce the overall impact. But Twitter could still look to incorporate what it learns from the test for its overall tweet ranking algorithm, which could also impact general tweets.
Yelp For Business Adds Keyword Boosting Options
Yelp introduced Keyword Boosting, enabling business owners to optimise their ads for specific keywords. Yelp also expanded its Custom Location Targeting to more advertisers, enhanced its ad budgeting feature, and added templates for Yelp Connect subscribers.
Combining Keyword Boosting with Yelp’s Keyword Blocking option enables businesses to more narrowly target their campaigns to audiences looking for the specific products or services they are promoting.
Bing News PubHub Moves To Bing Webmaster Tools
Microsoft announced the move of Bing News PubHub out of its own microsite and into the overall Bing Webmaster Tools console, making it easier for publishers who have already verified their sites with Bing Webmaster Tools to access the Bing News PubHub features.
With PubHub, publishers—big or small, international, or local—will be able to reach Bing users with fresh, relevant, and diverse content, helping them attract an influential audience and deliver improved results. In addition to the browser, Bing helps you get in front of millions of people using Windows 10/11 and Outlook through Outlook News Connector.
Instagram Adds ‘Your Activity’ Display With Improved Content Management Tools
Instagram’s now rolling out its updated activity dashboard to all users, which includes its new bulk delete option, making it easier to manage your displayed content. You can also archive content that you may want to keep, but no longer want to appear on your profile display.
In certain countries, some users will now also have the option to enable two-factor authentication using WhatsApp, providing another advanced security option for your account.
Microsoft Advertising Launches Cruise Ads
Microsoft Advertising launched its latest vertical-specific ad format, Cruise Ads, the fifth vertical-specific format Microsoft launched. The new ad format uses search intent & dynamically-generated elements to deliver relevant ad experiences based on data feeds.
Cruise Ads appear on the right-hand side of the Bing search results and appear alongside mainline text ads. They can trigger for queries such as cruise name, location, length, etc.
LinkedIn Rolls Out Sales Navigator Search
LinkedIn announced updates to its Sales Navigator platform which includes a “Bookmarked Alerts” tab, CRM integration, and a new tool called “At-Risk Opportunities”, providing a report of people who have left open opportunities directly into Sales Navigator.
LinkedIn’s also updated its Search options in Sales Navigator, providing more insight as to how you can use the available data to help you pinpoint the right leads and accounts faster.
Meta Drops “News” From Facebook’s News Feed
Facebook has announced that it’s renaming the ‘News Feed’, the main element of the app, to simply ‘Feed’ in order to simplify branding. Facebook explained that this is “just a name change to better reflect the diverse content people see on their Feeds,” and that it shouldn’t “impact the app experience more broadly”.
The Feed will now be the place where users scroll to see the latest updates from family, friends, groups, brand pages, and of course, ads.
Twitter Now Lets You Pin Up To 6 DM Conversations
Twitter announced that it will now enable users to pin up to six conversations to the top of their DM inbox for easy access. The feature is available on iOS, Android, and the web. By swiping right on any chat, you’ll see a new pin option appear, which will enable you to keep that exchange at the top of the stream, even as new DMs come in.
Meta Announces New Restrictions on the Creation and Use of Profile Image Frames
Facebook announced new changes to the profile frames feature, officially shutting down the ability for users to create customised profile frames. While profile frames will still exist, only frames from “certain government services or organizations and those providing authoritative information on COVID-19” will be available to users.
Meta says that only municipal, state and local agencies (including local election offices), municipal government agencies, emergency response agencies, public health agencies and local law enforcement will now be allowed to create profile frames.
Twitter Adds Labels To Identify Automated Accounts As “Good Bots”
To make it easier for users to differentiate automated from human-run accounts, Twitter introduced a new feature for automated accounts (bots) to self-identify as “good bots” by adding a label (a robot head) to their profile.
Launched as an experiment in September last year, the use of the label is now being expanded globally. All automated accounts will now have the option to add the new label to their Account Profile.
Microsoft Ads Launches Dynamic Descriptions For Dynamic Search Ads
Microsoft Ads announced its Dynamic Descriptions for Dynamic Search Ads where advertisers can now choose to serve dynamic descriptions to users. Starting in April, all existing DSA campaigns will be forced over to dynamic descriptions and will become the default option for new DSA campaigns.
Microsoft Advertising will notify advertisers affected by this change via email with directions on how to opt out after the change occurs in April.
Microsoft Advertising Launched Auto-Apply Recommendations
Microsoft announced auto-apply recommendations are now out of beta and have been officially released on Microsoft Advertising. By default, advertisers will opt into auto-apply for all the five recommendation types.
Currently, there are five recommendation types:
- Create Expanded Text Ads
- Create Responsive Search Ads
- Create Multimedia Ads
- Remove Negative Keywords Conflicts
- Fix Conversion Goal Setting Issue
Meta launches Facebook Reels in Australia
Meta announced Facebook Reels is now available in Australia both on iOS and Android, along with 150 countries around the world which gives better ways for creators to earn money, including new creation tools, as well as more places to watch and create Facebook Reels.
The ad format has two versions: a semi-transparent overlay at the bottom of a Facebook Reel and a sticker ad that can be placed by a creator within the Reel.
Bing All In One SEO And IndexNow Integration
Bing announces the All In One (AIOSEO) SEO Plugin for WordPress now supports the IndexNow protocol, instantly informing search engines of content changes.
Once activated, the protocol will alert search engines every time you:
- Publish new content
- Update old content
- Delete posts/pages
The protocol will alert search engines every time you publish, update, and delete posts.
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