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Users will be able to prompt a Candid Story among their connections via a new option within the Stories Camera. Then, after you launch your first Candid, Instagram will continue to prompt you and your connections with a daily notification to capture another Candid, and share what you’re all up to at a given time.

So it’s BeReal, in IG, with Instagram once again looking to negate the growth of competing app by replicating its core features, and expanding their reach to its billion-plus users.

Which, in BeReal’s case, is actually pretty easy. BeReal has seen huge growth this year, and even won the recent App of the Year title on iOS. But the challenge for BeReal is where it goes next.

Is it an app, or is it a function? And if it’s a function, then maybe it actually fits better within Instagram or another, larger platform, where it can be accessed by the largest pool of users.

I suspect that the BeReal app, while popular, is fairly restricted in its growth options, and that Instagram’s clone feature will potentially prove more popular in the long run due to broader reach and exposure.

Pinterest's new CEO Bill Ready wants to find ways to increase how much time its existing users spend on Pinterest, and earn more revenue from those users. To do that, he wants to make all of the products seen on Pinterest shoppable, so a user can easily click and buy each one.

That could be good for creators, who already tag products on Idea Pins by searching for existing Pins or creating new Pins by using links from retailers’ websites or affiliate links. More Pinterest users buying from these links could mean more revenue for creators and for Pinterest. 

Advertisers who wish to sell their own products as shoppable ads on Pinterest must set up a catalog on the platform, which requires continually updating their product list and pricing. Sellers who build such catalogs likely will want to pay influencers to encourage users to buy from them.

Pinterest has supported its creators with payouts from a dedicated creator fund. It’s unclear how Ready and activist investor Elliott Management, which recently took a board seat, think about such funds.

Some TikTok creators are starting to adapt their content strategies to make their videos more SEO friendly, following a September New York Times report that Gen Z prefers TikTok over Google as a search engine.

Google executive Prabhakar Raghavan said in July that his company's research found roughly 40% of young people turn to TikTok or Instagram instead of Google Maps or Search when looking for a place to eat, according to the Times report.

Creators also told Insider that they believe TikTok has started favouring videos that are more SEO friendly, based on their discussions with other TikTokers who were struggling to maintain their engagement rates and get their videos in front of more users.

Some creators reported that these techniques have helped brands discover their content more easily.

Here are three SEO strategies the TikTokers have had success with:

• Use specific hashtags to make your videos more discoverable. Twenty-year-old education TikToker Youssef Hasweh said he uses hashtags including #highschoolsenior and #classof2023 to improve the ranking of his videos when users search those terms in TikTok's discover page.
• Turn on auto-captions. Solo travel creator Abigail Akinyemi said TikTok's automatic-captioning feature picks up on keywords in her content, and highlights them on the screen.
• Change your handle and bio to reflect your content niche. Marrero, who focuses on skincare-and-beauty content, said that her videos became drastically more discoverable after she changed her TikTok handle to include what her content was about.

The new function, which mimics AIM’s away messages, highlights a generational divide among Instagram users.

Instagram’s new Notes feature, launched last week, evoked memories of AOL Instant Messenger. AIM, a cultural phenomenon in the late 1990s and early 2000s, where internet slang such as LOL for “laugh out loud” and BRB for “be right back” spread.

In those days, before texting and social media took hold, users would rush home after school or work and log on to AIM. They often had wacky usernames, like “SpiceyWic3y,” and exchanged messages with friends as long as their dial-up internet could handle it. When they were away from their computer, they could leave silly notes—much like the Instagram Notes feature—to let their friends know when they were “AFK,” or “away from keyboard.”

The Notes feature and its AIM ancestor highlight a generational divide between millennials, who were born from around 1981 to 1996, and members of Gen Z, who were born roughly from 1997 to 2010. While millennials loved AIM away messages, side parts and skinny jeans, many of their younger peers want nothing to do with those things.

Many of the younger Instagram users who are confused by Notes have never used AIM. On social media in recent days, some people said they just didn’t get the new feature.

Instagram said in a blog post that it added Notes because people like “a lightweight, easy way to share what’s on their mind and start conversations.” Notes stay up for 24 hours before disappearing. People can tap on them to respond. (WSJ)

• How influencers actually make money. (Wishu)
• Instagram adds new measures to help users regain access to locked accounts. (Social Media Today)
• Meta shuts down Cameo-like ‘Super’ app. (Social Media Today)
• TikTok tests new horizontal, full-width display for videos. (Social Media Today)