Expanded Ecommerce on Facebook & Instagram & This Week’s Digital Marketing News [PODCAST]

Hosts Jess Budde, Greg Finn, and Christine “Shep” Zirnheld are covering all the digital marketing news of the week on this week’s episode of Marketing O’Clock.

Plus, why the new CVS ad network and Google’s heavy ad policy have us listing to Sarah McLachlan, the Deftones, and seagulls on repeat.

If you’re unable to listen on Spotify, check out our smiling faces on YouTube! You can catch full video episodes each and every week.

Instagram Checkout & Facebook Shops 

Facebook announced enhanced ecommerce experiences on Facebook and Instagram apps and that all selling fees will be waived through the end of 2020.

Facebook Shops and Instagram Checkout are both expanding to all U.S. businesses and creators.

Retailers will be able to manage both their Facebook and Instagram shops through a single online store.

Shops will integrate with Instagram Direct and Facebook Messenger so retailers can assist customers while they shop on the apps.

Finally, they announced the launch of live shoppable videos on both apps.

Google Career Certificates

Google announced professional six-month certificate programs for Data Analyst, Project Manager, and UX Designer career paths.

The new programs will help job hunters fast-track employment regardless of formal education or experience.

Google said that they will treat the certificates as the equivalent of four-year degrees in related fields in their own hiring practices.

Is Apple going to launch a search engine?

There has been significant evidence that Apple may be planning to develop its own search engine to compete with Google.

Updates to the Applebot web crawler page and Spotlight Search seem to shed light on Apple’s future plans.

Short-format videos spotted on Google Discover

Short videos from Trell and Tangi have been spotted in a carousel format on Google Discover recently.

The new test, along with the upcoming lunch of YouTube “Shorts” are compelling reasons for brands to invest in short video content.

This week’s take of the week comes from Anna Blanken, who isn’t pulling punches when it comes to agencies being forthright with their clients (and former clients).

Agencies that hold client data hostage are terrorists. Change my mind. #ppcchat

— Anna Blanken (@anna_arrow) August 27, 2020

Then, ICYMI, Martin McDonald, doesn’t have a lot of confidence in Apple’s new search engine.

If Apple do release a web-search engine, it’ll be the same as their maps product.

Initially absolute trash, so we all ignore it, then sneakily over about 6 years they catch up but nobody notices, and only die-hard fans care.

— searchmartin (@searchmartin) August 27, 2020

We answer these important digital marketing questions during our lightning round segment:

• Who is upset that Google Ads isn’t giving them a break on their unpaid invoices?
• What is Spotify’s new “podcast topics” search?
• When is TikTok launching shoppable live streams?
• Where can you find new data on calls from your Google Ads?
• Why do webmasters need to know what Google considers “heavy ads”
• How can you identify featured snippets in Google Search Console?

For more digital marketing news stories, head over to the Marketing O’Clock site. Don’t forget to subscribe while you’re there!

Featured Image Credit: Cypress North