Today's Guide to the Marketing Jungle from Social Media Examiner...
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New week, fresh insights, Alluser! Stay sharp with the latest updates on AI, social media marketing, and emerging trends. Here's what you need to know.
In today's edition:
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Is your Meta ad targeting too tight?
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Are your social channels quietly losing customer trust?
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Instagram Updates: Carousel Insights, Edits App Enhancements, and More
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This prompt will improve your content's traffic, engagement, and rankings
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🗞️ Industry news from Anthropic, Google, and more
Your Meta Targeting Might Be Hurting Your Ads
If you're segmenting audiences by age, gender, or detailed interests, thinking that precision equals performance, you might be creating more problems than results.
In this short video, Jon Loomer breaks down why Meta's algorithm now treats your targeting inputs as mere suggestions and how old tactics can actually increase costs, stall performance, and dilute your budget.
You'll also get practical advice for using ad copy and visuals to enhance and fine-tune your targeting. Watch it here.
Research: Consumer Trust and Social Media Platforms
In the latest 2025 ACSI Entertainment Study, trust in Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube may be steady, but a closer look reveals emerging cracks in the foundation.
YouTube and LinkedIn lead with strong scores of 78, while TikTok (77) and Instagram (76) show steady performance. Snapchat and X both gain 6%, reaching 72 and 73, respectively, driven by platform refinements and shifting user bases. Facebook remains flat at 70, continuing to trail behind due to persistent user dissatisfaction. Reddit climbs modestly to 72, buoyed by content relevance and moderation improvements.
Whether you're building your brand or optimizing social ad spend, these ad relevance and content trust ranking insights could help shape where and how you engage next. Read more about the study here.
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On this week's Social Media Marketing Talk Show, host Jerry Potter and Amber Figlow break down the latest Instagram news and what it means for marketers like you.
Trial Reels Access Clarified
Trial reels have been available for some time, but Instagram has now officially clarified who gets access to this growth-focused feature. This update is important for marketers who are wondering why they don't see the trial reel option when publishing content.
You have to have at least a thousand followers, and you have to have a public-facing account. "So, no, private accounts get access to trial reels," says Amber Figlow.
Content strategists are finding creative ways to integrate trial reels into their broader marketing strategies, and Figlow shares her personal approach.
"So I've been playing with it for myself and for clients. One of the fun things that I'm testing as I play with the new Edits platform from Instagram and Meta is their video editing tool. And even though it's not quite my typical content style, I'll edit something quickly on edits and push it out just as a trial reel, just to see."
This experimentation capability is particularly valuable for brands that maintain a consistent content style but want to test broader appeal content.
For client work, Figlow takes a more strategic approach. "And then for clients…specific pieces of content that we think are going to have a little bit more visibility, a little bit more reach. We'll also push it out as a trial reel. So we posted both in the regular feed for our audience to see, and then we'll also test it as a trial reel to see how things perform."
Brand partnerships present another interesting use case. "One fun bonus that I want to start pitching. If I have like a brand partnership or if I'm working on like a very fun piece of content with another brand or something like that, I want to start offering it as an add on as a bonus of, hey, it's going to be posted in my regular feed, but I'm also going to post it as a trial reel," Figlow explains.
Figlow also identifies specific content types that work well for trial reels: "For me, trends aren't a really big
part of my content strategy, but if there's one that I love and it's really going viral amongst Instagram users, I am more likely to push it out as a trial reel to engage new community members."
This approach helps maintain brand consistency while still experimenting with broader appeal content.
Individual Carousel Slide Likes
Instagram is testing an analytics feature that could transform marketers' understanding of carousel post performance. This update provides unprecedented insight into user behavior by revealing exactly which slide in a carousel post triggers engagement actions like likes.
When you can identify which specific slides generate the strongest emotional response from your audience, you can extract those high-performing elements and develop them into stand-alone content pieces. This creates a data-driven approach to identifying your most valuable content elements rather than guessing which parts of your carousels resonate most strongly.
The initial testing has revealed useful patterns in user engagement that can inform content strategy. If you notice a big drop off after slide five, "maybe I only create five slides now," Figlow suggests.
Figlow sees particular value in using this insight for content expansion. If slide two or three receives a high number of likes, "maybe that could become a post of its own, or it could be a reel."
Instagram Notes Customization Options
Instagram has expanded the customization options available for Notes, the small text-based messages that appear in the direct messages interface. While Notes may seem like a minor feature, they represent an underutilized touchpoint for brand communication and audience engagement.
From a marketing perspective, Notes offer a unique communication channel that reaches audiences in a different context than typical feed content. Since Notes appear in the messaging interface, they catch users' attention when actively engaging in conversations and checking direct messages, potentially creating higher engagement rates than feed-based content.
The recent updates provide more visual control over Notes' appearance. "Now, instead of just quickly putting up some text on there, you can also change the background color and add like an emoji avatar, almost," Figlow explains.
While Figlow doesn't personally use Notes in her strategy, she recognizes their potential value for specific use cases.
More Features, Tools, Changes, and Updates Discussed Include:
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Auto-Scroll Feature
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Enhanced Instagram Edits Features
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Multi-Language DM Translation and Message Scheduling
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Link in Bio Reach Addressed
Watch it on YouTube
1 Prompt to Benchmark Your Content Against 20+ Best Practices
Why does some content do well in traffic, engagement, and rankings—while other posts barely register a pulse? Andy Crestodina is sharing a powerful AI prompt that acts like your personal content strategist, auditing your blog post against 22 proven best practices.
Whether you're still figuring out how to get the most out of AI tools, or you've been using them to streamline your marketing for months, this prompt gives you a structured way to analyze and improve your content—without needing a degree in SEO or user psychology. It's practical, fast, and designed for marketers who want more results from every article.
You'll walk away with an in-depth checklist drawn from data-backed strategies and 10,000+ blog audits. Read more here.
Claude Code Adds Customizable Sub‑Agents: Anthropic's Claude Code now supports sub‑agents—specialized AI personalities each configured with its own system prompt, tooling access, and isolated context. These can be created via the /agents command and stored at either the project or the user level. Sub‑agents offer focused capabilities (such as code review or test automation), maintain clean context separation, and enable reusable workflows across teams. They may be triggered automatically based on task descriptions or manually invoked by name. Claude Code delivers more robust and structured automation across diverse coding and business workflows by delegating tasks to sub-agents with domain-specific instruction and limited permissions. Anthropic
Google Launches Opal: No-Code Tool to Build AI Mini‑Apps: Google has introduced Opal, a new experimental product from Google Labs that allows users to create and share AI-powered mini-apps without writing code. Opal turns natural language descriptions into multi-step workflows that link together Google's AI models for tasks like content generation or research. Users can start from gallery templates or build from scratch, and each app step is editable to fine-tune prompts and logic. Apps can be published instantly and shared with a simple link. Google Developers Blog
Google Introduces AI‑Enhanced Search Organization: Google has unveiled Web Guide, a new search experiment available via Search Labs that reorganizes standard web search results into meaningful topic-based clusters rather than a typical list of blue links. Powered by a custom Gemini AI model, Web Guide uses a multi-query approach to group relevant pages under headings tailored to different facets of your search. The feature is currently available in the Web tab for users who opt in and allows switching back to regular results at any time. Google plans to gradually roll it out to the All tab as well. While it complements existing AI features like AI Mode, Web Guide emphasizes structured links over generated summaries. Google
goo.gl URL Shortener Shutdown: Google will permanently deactivate all existing goo.gl links on August 25, 2025, meaning all URLs using the format will begin returning 404 errors after that date. Google discontinued new goo.gl link creation in 2018 and shut down the service for management entirely in 2019. Businesses and marketers relying on goo.gl links should audit and migrate them immediately to prevent broken links and loss of traffic. The Verge
Threads API Adds Polls, Metrics, and Advanced Search Tools: Meta has rolled out major upgrades to the Threads API, enabling developers to add location and polls to posts, and retrieve poll results. A streamlined parameter now allows quicker creation of text-only threads. Users can also manage posts more effectively, with options to delete them, restrict replies to followers, and receive real-time mention notifications via a new webhook. Additional updates include support for topic tags, enhanced keyword searches with date filters, click-through metrics, and GIF media access. Meta
What Did You Think of Today's Newsletter?
Did You Know?
Manatees have no biting teeth—only molars for grinding plants. Uniquely, their teeth are constantly replaced throughout their lives. New molars grow at the back and gradually move forward as old ones are worn down and lost; this continual conveyor belt system is rare in mammals and helps them cope with gritty, sand-filled food.
Michael Stelzner, Founder and CEO
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