Missed the important digital marketing news and updates from last week? We’ve got you covered with the WDA Digital Marketing Round-Up. This week, news includes Google My Business messaging functionality, Passage Based indexing, Shopify’s new integration with Facebook and Instagram Shops, and much more.

Let’s delve into it…

Google

Google My Business Messaging Functionality: Google has added messaging functionality for users on web browsers and not just the mobile app. It’s not fully live yet but a lot of users already appear to have access. It appears as part of the left-hand navigation as a clickable button.

Duplicate Image Results Reduced: Google recently announced that back in November last year they rolled out an update to image search to reduce duplicated images. Images that appear now shouldn’t be duplicated and you should get access to more diverse image results thanks to the update.

Google said… “we hope this improvement, which we introduced in November, helps everyone better make use of Google Images to be inspired and informed as they search visually.”

Passage Based Indexing: You may recall that Passage Based Indexing was first announced late last year as a new way to display specific passages from ranking pages in the search results. The update went live as of the 10th of Feb for US English search results. Google stated that the roll-out of the update could impact up to 7% of queries when it’s completely launched.

Google Photos Video Editing Features Improved: Google has recently improved the video editing features available in Google photos with the addition of filters, enhancing specific elements, new cropping options and the ability to change perspective.

Google stated… “There are now more than 30 controls, but a good place to start is with cropping and straightening the frame to focus more on the subject. And if the scene is poorly exposed, you can adjust the brightness to make your video shine.”

Facebook/Instagram

Facebook to Create Clubhouse Clone: Facebook recently created its TikTok clone with Instagram Reels and they look to be set to do the same with Clubhouse.

The New York Times reported… “Facebook executives have ordered employees to create a similar product [to Clubhouse], said the people, who were not authorized to speak publicly. The product is in its earliest stages of development, they said.”

Shopify ‘Shop Pay’ Available on Facebook and Instagram Shops: Shopify recently announced an all-new integrated with Facebook and Instagram Shops that will enable users to purchase items using the ‘Shop Pay’ in-stream payment option.

Here’s what Shopify said… “We’re expanding Shop Pay – the fastest and most secure way to shop online – to all Shopify merchants selling on Facebook and Instagram. With Shop Pay now available as a fast and secure payment option on Facebook, people also get access to industry-leading order tracking and carbon offsets from their deliveries.”

Other

Manual CPC Getting Replaced in Microsoft Ads: Beginning in March, Microsoft will start to replace the manual cost per click bidding option with enhanced cost per click across search, shopping and dynamic search. The update should have completely rolled out by the end of April. We’d recommend that advertisers start testing automated bidding options ahead of the migration.

WDA’s Highlight of the Week

Our highlight from this week’s WDA Marketing Round-Up is Shopify ‘Shop Pay’ getting expanded to Facebook and Instagram Shops. The integration of this only makes sense with the number of users on Shopify and will hopefully provide an even more seamless social e-commerce experience.

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