Livestream e-commerce: Why companies and brands need to tune in

Alanna Gregory Contributor

Alanna Gregory is a marketing executive and is currently senior global director at Afterpay. Previously, she was VP at Hairstory, the founder and CEO of VIVE Lifestyle, and was an AVP at Barclays.

More posts by this contributor

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What comes to mind when you think of livestreaming? In the U.S., most people would name their favorite celebrity leading a Q&A on Instagram or a gamer doing a speedrun on Twitch.

In China, it’s shopping, streamed live.

Livestream e-commerce has taken off in China in the last few years and is expected to yield more than $60 billion this year. In 2019, 37% of online shoppers in China (a cool 265 million people) made purchases on livestreams — and that was well before quarantine. In 2020, it’s estimated to have reached around 560 million people.

During Taobao’s annual Single’s Day Global Shopping Festival in 2020 (China’s Black Friday), livestreams accounted for $6 billion in sales — nearly doubled from a year earlier.

Starting to see a trend? The big U.S. companies have noticed, and they’re jumping on the bandwagon faster than you can say, “Swipe up to buy now!”

Last December, Walmart livestreamed shopping events on TikTok. Amazon released a live platform where influencers promote items and chat with customers. Instagram launched a Shop feature that encourages users to browse and buy within the app. Facebook also kicked off Live Shopping Fridays for the beauty and fashion categories.

“It’s an entertaining way for shops to tell the story behind their products. It brings buyers closer than ever to their favorite creators and allows them to have a voice in the conversation.”

Startups are growing fast to keep up with the heavy hitters — PopShop.Live raised $20 million to let people buy everything from books and toys to jewelry from sellers who livestream their offerings, and Whatnot raised a $50 million Series B, largely to expand its livestream commerce infrastructure. There’s also a burgeoning category of SaaS tools such as Bambuser, which is working with brands like Klarna to test native livestream shopping directly within branded apps.

At this pace, retailers will all welcome livestream commerce teams like they have influencer partnerships in recent years. It’ll just be part of the digital equation to stay competitive and relevant in the future of marketplaces and e-commerce.

From B.C. to 5G: The evolution of shopping

What is old is new again. Your grandparents spent years watching QVC because it balanced the experience of speaking with an associate with the convenience of their retirement community’s TV room. Livestream is today’s version of “shoptainment,” where hosts showcase products dynamically, interact with their audiences and build urgency with short-term offers, giveaways and limited-edition items.

Now, with livestream commerce, hosts can form deeper customer connections and answer questions in real time. It’s a new standard of communication that holds a longstanding truth from Istanbul’s Grand Bazaar to smartphones: People shop to kill time and are more likely to buy when they feel connected with a salesperson.

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Fortnite’s new ‘superstar’ virtual music tour kicks off next week

Epic Games is teasing the biggest in-game event since Travis Scott psychedelically stomped through Fortnite’s virtual meadows.

The mysterious new event, which Fortnite-maker Epic is calling the “Rift Tour,” will kick off on Friday, August 6 and run through Sunday, August 8. In the teaser announcement, Epic invites players to “take a musical journey into magical new realities where Fortnite and a record-breaking superstar collide.”

Escape into the Rift

Take a musical journey to magical new realities and drop into the Rift Tour August 6-8 https://t.co/1ljUFhYrL5 pic.twitter.com/GFIUYB5hGC

— Fortnite (@FortniteGame) July 29, 2021

In-game events building up to the mystery show series will run from July 29 through August 8, so players can hop into Fortnite to check out new Rift Tour-themed quests and rewards now. The cotton-candy-colored event will offer a custom loading screen and a fluffy cloud kitty emoticon, among other digital prizes.

The Rift Tour isn’t a one-and-done event. Like the Travis Scott event, Fortnite will host five different show times across three days to make it easier for players to catch. Epic says they’ll have more details to share on Monday, August 2, so Fortnite players will have to wait for more hints or an official announcement about who’s performing.

So … who’s performing? So far, all signs point to Ariana Grande. Leakers have been saying as much for more than a week, and the documents revealed through Epic’s court battle with Apple also detailed plans for in-game events with both Grande and Lady Gaga.

Image Credits: Epic Games

Wave opens the door for musicians looking for a ‘metaverse’ beyond Fortnite

At Forbes, Paul Tassi also connected the dots on how recent leaks point to Grande, including some visual themes from her music videos and a reference to her pet pig Piggy Smalls.

Since Epic is calling its latest virtual event a tour, that suggests Grande won’t be alone, if she is indeed the mystery superstar. A Lady Gaga appearance could also be in the cards, since Epic apparently had plans for Gaga to appear in a December 2020 concert that never materialized. Kanye West is also releasing his newest album on August 6, but it seems less likely that Epic would be willing to partner with West given his myriad recent controversies. And “Donda,” West’s latest album, was originally scheduled for a different date before being delayed.

Whoever it winds up being, we’ll likely know more on Monday. Even if you’re not a Grande fan or a regular gamer, Fortnite’s in-game concerts are some of the most creative and visually exciting virtual events to date.

Everyone should fall through the metaverse with their friends while a skyscraper-sized virtual rapper shoots neon lightning bolts at least once.

Fortnite hosted a psychedelic Travis Scott concert and 12.3M people watched

We need more video games that are social platforms first, games second

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Twitter shuttering NY, SF offices in response to new CDC guidelines

Just two weeks after reopening its New York and San Francisco offices, social media giant Twitter said Wednesday that it will be closing those offices “immediately.”

The decision came “after careful consideration of the CDC’s updated guidelines, and in light of current conditions,” a spokesperson said.

“Twitter has made the decision to close our opened offices in New York and San Francisco as well as pause future office reopenings, effective immediately. We’re continuing to closely monitor local conditions and make necessary changes that prioritize the health and safety of our Tweeps,” the spokesperson added.

The company initially just reopened those offices on July 12. It declined to reveal headcount per office.

The CDC this week recommended that fully vaccinated people begin wearing masks indoors again in places with high Covid transmission rates amid concerns about the highly contagious Delta variant.

Earlier today, TechCrunch’s Brian Heater reported that Google CEO Sundar Pichai announced that the company will require employees to be vaccinated before returning to work on-site. It was part of a larger letter sent to Google/Alphabet staff that also noted the company will be extending its work-from-home policy through October 18, as the COVID-19 delta variant continues to sweep through the global population.

In a message to TechCrunch, Facebook’s VP of People, Lori Goler, confirmed a similar policy for the social media behemoth.

Amazon also responded to TechCrunch’s inquiry on the matter, noting, “We strongly encourage Amazon employees and contractors to be vaccinated as soon as COVID-19 vaccines are available to them.”

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Spotify’s Clubhouse rival, Greenroom, tops 140K installs on iOS, 100K on Android

Spotify’s recently launched live audio app and Clubhouse rival, Spotify Greenroom, has a long road ahead of it if it wants to take on top social audio platforms like Clubhouse, Airtime, Spoon and others, not to mention those from top social networks, like Twitter and Facebook. To date, the new Greenroom app has only been downloaded a total of 141,000 times on iOS, according to data from app intelligence firm Sensor Tower. This includes downloads from its earlier iteration, Locker Room — an app Spotify acquired to make its move into live audio.

On Android, Google Play data indicates the app has been installed over 100,000 times, but Sensor Tower cannot yet confirm this figure.

For comparison, Clubhouse today has 30.2 million total installs, 18.7 million of which are on iOS, Sensor Tower says.

Other top audio apps include Airtime, with 11.4 million iOS installs, out of a total of 14.3 million (including Android); and Spoon, with 7.6 million iOS installs, out of a total of  27.3 million.

International apps like UAE’s Yalla and China’s Lizhi are massive, as well, with the former sporting 48.1 total installs, 3.8 million of which are on iOS. The latter has 29.5+ million total installs, but only a handful on iOS.

There are other newcomers that have managed to stake smaller claims in the social audio space, too, including Fishbowl (759,000 total installs), Cappuccino (497,000 installs), Riff (339,000 installs) and Sonar (154,000 installs.)

Image Credits: Sensor Tower. The firm analyzed 34 social audio apps. The chart shows those with the most installs.  

Spotify Greenroom’s launch last month, meanwhile, seems to have attracted only a small fraction of Spotify’s larger user base, which has now grown to 365 million monthly active users.

The majority of Greenroom’s installs — around 106,000 — took place after Greenroom’s official launch on July 16, 2021 through July 25, 2021, Sensor Tower says. Counting only its Greenroom installs, the app is ranked at No. 12 among social audio apps. It follows Tin Can, which gained 127,000 installs since launching in early March.

Because Greenroom took over Locker Room’s install base, some portion of Greenroom’s total iOS installs (141K) included downloads that occurred when the app was still Locker Room. But that number is fairly small. Sensor Tower estimates Locker Room saw only around 35,000 total iOS installs to date. That includes the time frame of October 26, 2020 — the month when the sports chat app launched to the public — up until the day before Greenroom’s debut (July 15, 2021).

We should also point out that downloads are not the same thing as registered users, and are far short of active users. Many people download a new app to try it, but then abandon it shortly after downloading it, or never remember to open it at all.

That means the number of people actively using Greenroom at this time, is likely much smaller that these figures indicate.

Spotify declined to comment on third-party estimates.

Spotify is getting into live audio because of course it is

While Sensor Tower looked at competition across social audio apps on the app stores, Spotify’s competition in the live audio market won’t be limited to standalone apps, of course.

Other large tech platforms have more recently integrated social audio into their apps, too, including Facebook (Live Audio Rooms), Twitter (Spaces), Discord (Stage Channels) and trading app Public. A comparison with Greenroom here is not possible, as these companies would have to disclose how many of their active users are engaging with live audio, and they have not yet done so.

Despite what may be a slower uptake, Greenroom shouldn’t be counted out yet. The app is brand-new, and has time to catch up if all goes well. (And if the market for live audio, in general, continues to grow — even though the height of Covid lockdowns, which prompted all this live audio socializing in the first place, seems to have passed.)

Spotify’s success or failure with live audio will be particularly interesting to watch given the potential for the company to cross-promote live audio shows, events, and artist-produced content through its flagship streaming music application. What sort of programming Greenroom may later include is still unknown, however.

Spotify launches its live audio app and Clubhouse rival, Spotify Greenroom

Following Spotify’s acquisition of Locker Room maker Betty Labs, the company said it would roll out programmed content related to music, culture, and entertainment, in addition to sports. It also launched a Creator Fund to help fuel the app with new content. 

But so far, Spotify hasn’t given its users a huge incentive to visit Greenroom.

The company, during its Q2 2021 earnings, explained why. It said it first needed to get Greenroom stabilized for a “Spotify-sized audience,” which it why it only soft-launched the app in June. Going forward, Spotify says there will be “more tie-ins” with the main Spotify app, but didn’t offer any specifics.

“Obviously we’ll leverage our existing distribution on Spotify,” noted Spotify CEO Daniel Ek. “But this feels like a great way to learn, experiment and iterate, much faster than if we had to wait for a full on integration into the main app,” he added.

Spotify’s podcast ad revenue jumps 627% in Q2

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Facebook warns of ‘headwinds’ to its ad business from regulators and Apple

Facebook posted its second quarter earnings Wednesday, beating expectations with $29 billion in revenue.

The world’s biggest social media company was expected to report $27.8 billion in revenue for the quarter, a 50 percent increase from the same period in 2020. Facebook reported earnings per share of $3.61, which also bested expectations. The company’s revenue was $18.6 billion in the same quarter of last year.

In the first financial period to really reflect a return to quasi-economic normalcy after a very online pandemic year, Facebook met user growth expectations. At the end of March, Facebook boasted 2.85 billion monthly active users across its network of apps. At the end of its second quarter, Facebook reported 2.9 billion monthly active users, roughly what was expected.

The company’s shares opened at $375 on Wednesday morning and were down to $360 in a dip following the earnings report.

In spite of a strong quarter, Facebook is warning of change ahead — namely impacts to its massive ad business, which generated $28.5 billion out of the company’s $29 billion this quarter. The company specifically named privacy-focused updates to Apple’s mobile operating system as a threat to its business.

“We continue to expect increased ad targeting headwinds in 2021 from regulatory and platform changes, notably the recent iOS updates, which we expect to have a greater impact in the third quarter compared to the second quarter,” the company stated its investor report outlook.

Facebook isn’t happy about Apple’s upcoming ad tracking restrictions

On the company’s investor call, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg pointed to Facebook’s plans to reduce its reliance on ad revenue, noting the company’s expanded efforts to attract and support content creators and its e-commerce plans in particular. “We want our platforms to be the best place for creators to make a living,” Zuckerberg said.

Zuckerberg also emphasized Facebook’s grand aspirations for social experiences in VR. “Virtual reality will be a social platform, which is why we’re so focused on building it,” Zuckerberg said.

No matter what Facebook planned to report Wednesday, the company is a financial beast. Bad press and user mistrust in the West haven’t done much to hurt its bottom line and the company’s ad business is looking as dominant as ever. Short of meaningful antitrust reform in the U.S. or a surging competitor, there’s little to stand in Facebook’s way. The former might still be a long shot given partisan gridlock in Congress, even with the White House involved, but Facebook is finally facing a threat from the latter.

For years, it’s been difficult to imagine a social media platform emerging as a proper rival to the company, given Facebook’s market dominance and nasty habit of acquiring competitors or brazenly copying their innovations, but it’s clear that TikTok is turning into just that. YouTube is huge, but the platforms matured in parallel and co-exist, offering complementary experiences.

Facebook predicts ‘significant’ obstacles to ad targeting and revenue in 2021

TikTok hit 700 million monthly active users in July 2020 and surpassed three billions global downloads earlier this month, becoming the only non-Facebook owned app to do so, according to data from Sensor Tower. If the famously addictive short form video app can successfully siphon off some of the long hours that young users spend on Instagram and Facebook’s other platforms and make itself a cozy home for brands in the process, the big blue giant out of Menlo Park might finally have something to lose sleep over.

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Snapchat adds My Places feature to Snap Map, recommending spots to visit

As more people are venturing out into the world this summer (safely, we hope!), Snapchat wants to make it easier for people to find restaurants, stores, parks and other interesting spots in their neighborhood. Today, Snapchat is starting to roll out the My Places feature on its Snap Map, which connects users with over 30 million businesses. Users can log their favorite spots, send them to friends, and find recommendations.

My Places has three main tabs: visited, favorites and popular. Visited lists places you’ve checked into on Snapchat, and favorites saves, well, your favorites. But the popular tab is particularly interesting because it marks the first time that Snapchat is using an algorithm to provide personalized recommendations to help people engage with the world around them. The algorithm considers where you are, what you’ve tagged or favorited already, and where your friends and other Snapchatters have visited.

This further differentiates the social-forward Snap Map from more established resources like Google Maps and Apple Maps, which you can’t really use to find out what restaurants your friends like. Sure, Snapchat can’t give you directions to that trendy sushi bar, but it’s not meant to, just like how Google Maps isn’t meant to show you what bar all your friends went to without you last night.

Image Credits: Snapchat

Snapchat shared survey results indicating that its users are more likely on average to engage in “post-pandemic” activities (is that a good thing?) and added that 44% of Snapchatters turn to the Snap Map to find places around them that they’re interested in.

With over 250 million monthly active users on Snap Map, the company announced an update in May called Layers, which lets partner companies add data directly to their own map. So far, Snapchat has collaborated with Ticketmaster and The Infatuation, a restaurant recommendation website — these partnerships help users see where they can find live entertainment, or what great restaurants are hidden in plain sight. Snapchat plans to further integrate Layers into Snap Map and My Places later this year.

Last week, Snap announced that during Q2 this year, it grew both revenue and daily active users at the highest rates it has achieved in the last four years. Year over year, the app grew 23%.

Snap had its best quarter in four years

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Twitter launches U.S. e-commerce pilot that lets users shop from profiles

Twitter this morning will launch a pilot in the U.S. aimed at testing the potential for e-commerce on its platform. The company is introducing a new “Shop Module” that offers brands, businesses and other retailers the ability to showcase their products to Twitter users directly on the business’ profile. Users will then be able to scroll through a carousel of product images in the module, and tap through on a product they’re interested in purchasing. This opens up the business’s website inside the Twitter app itself, where the customer can learn more about the product in question and opt to make a purchase.

The Shop Module itself will appear in a new, dedicated space at the top of a supported Twitter profile, which can be seen by U.S. users in English on iOS devices.

The company tells TechCrunch that only businesses with a Professional Profile will be able to use the feature at this time.

Professional Profiles, which began testing in April, give businesses, non-profits, publishers and creators the ability to display specific information about their business directly on their profile, including things like their address, phone number, operating hours, and more. Essentially, it’s the Twitter equivalent to something like a Facebook Page for a business.

At launch, the new Shop Module will be made available to only a small group of pilot testers. In addition to gaming retailer @GameStop and travel brand @ArdenCove, Twitter says there will only be approximately 10 other brands across the lifestyle, traditional retail, gaming, media and entertainment, tech and telco industries who will gain access to the new feature.

At present, Twitter isn’t offering a way for interested businesses to sign up for the pilot, as the company is only in the initial phases of testing this feature, it says.

Image Credits: Twitter

While Twitter users often discuss products on the app and even reach out to companies directly for help with purchases, it’s unclear whether users will come to view Twitter as a shopping platform.

With the pilot, Twitter aims to better understand what could help it to make that shift, by tracking which types of products drive traffic to online retailers. For example, it wants to determine whether people are inspired by online conversations in the heat of the moment — like sports fans buying team apparel — or whether Twitter users could be encouraged to make purchases of a more lasting impact, like products for a new skincare routine. Having a diverse lineup of early pilot testers will help the company to compare data across verticals to learn what works best.

Twitter says it will also work directly with businesses to better understand their needs through the creation of a new Merchant Advisory Board, which will consist of “best-in-class examples” of merchants on Twitter.

The company earlier this year had mentioned its plans to expand into e-commerce.

At Twitter’s Analyst Day presentation in February, where it first announced its Super Follow platform for creators, the company also briefly spoke about its e-commerce investments.

“We’re…starting to explore ways to better support commerce on Twitter,” Twitter Revenue Lead, Bruce Falck, had said during the event. “We know people come to Twitter to interact with brands and discuss their favorite products. In fact, you may have even noticed some businesses already developing creative ways to enable sales on our platform,” he continued.

“This demand gives us confidence in the power of combining real-time conversation with an engaged and intentional audience. Imagine easily discovering, and quickly purchasing, a new skincare product or trendy sneaker from a brand you follow with only a few clicks,” Falck added.

Since then, Twitter has tested a new e-commerce feature for tweets, which allowed businesses to link out to online product pages — like those on a Shopify store, for instance.

Twitter tests new e-commerce features for tweets

Twitter CFO Ned Segal also touted the potential to shop on Twitter when speaking to investors at the J.P. Morgan Technology, Media and Communications conference in May, noting that people “do a lot of research on Twitter before they buy something.”

Twitter’s entry into online shopping comes at a time when major tech companies and social platforms are ramping up their investments in e-commerce. Facebook has made significant moves into e-commerce with shopping features across Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, including with initiatives like online storefronts, integrated checkout, product drops, video shopping, and more.

Shopify has also partnered with a number of tech platforms, including Facebook, TikTok and Google, to make it easier for consumers to connect with products sold by its merchants.

It’s worth noting that Twitter previously attempted to run a commerce operation and failed. In 2017, the company begin to wind down its “Buy” button product, which had allowed Twitter users click to make purchases, and the retailer partnerships associated with that effort due to lack of traction. Clearly, the company believes the time is now right to try again.

Twitter is phasing out the “Buy” button, will continue to offer donations

 

 

 

 

 

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Discord rolls out threads, side conversations that auto-archive

After announcing that threads were on the way earlier this year and teasing the feature on Twitter, Discord is now introducing the long-requested way to make conversations in bustling servers more comprehensible.

Starting today, any server with “community” features enabled will be able to transform messages into threaded conversations, across mobile and desktop. Threads are designated by their own subject name, making it easy to compartmentalize an off-topic idea into its own mini-conversation.

pic.twitter.com/EbkxHNSVc0

— Discord (@discord) July 26, 2021

 

Channel members can create a thread by selecting a new hashtag symbol that now appears in the contextual menu when hovering over messages or pressing the plus sign in the chat bar and and choosing “create thread.” The feature will be enabled in all servers automatically by August 17.

“… We wanted to help communities stay engaged while avoiding having to shut down conversation to maintain organization,” the company wrote in a blog post announcing the feature, noting that hopping into a busy new channel can “feel like walking into the middle of three different movies.” Discord introduced replies last year to help the flow of conversations and threads is an expansion of that same idea.

From the flow of a channel, Discord’s new threads open up into a split-view pane instead of taking over the full screen, serving their function as side conversations naturally. Threaded topics will also show up in the list of channels and will open to the full screen if selected from the channel list.

Threads will auto-archive after 24 hours of inactivity — a nice way to keep channels from being clogged up with off-topic or time-sensitive chat. Boosted servers can keep a thread around for a week instead of a single day, giving a channel’s members more time to hop into relevant side conversations.

Servers that are boosted through Discord’s premium features will also be able to create private threads that don’t show up in the channel list. Private threads only appear to users who are manually added into them or mentioned by name within a thread.

Discord designed private threads so that users could hold group conversations without adding each person in the conversation as a friend, a feature that may be a boon to moderators looking to have one-on-one or small group chats more easily.

Moderators will also be able to designate who can create threads within a channel. Channel members can be given permissions to use private threads, manage threads or just be allowed to use public threads (“send messages” must be toggled on to allow them to create new threads). Threads will work the same way regular channels do for moderation bots.

Discord’s new Stage Discovery portal will connect live audio events with communities

Discord buys Sentropy, which makes AI software that fights online harassment

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TikTok expands LIVE platform with new features, including events, co-hosts, Q&As and more

TikTok announced this morning it’s expanding its TikTok LIVE platform, which currently allows creators to livestream to fans while responding to viewer comments and questions and accept virtual gifts. Now, the LIVE experience will include a number of new features for creators to make it more competitive with platforms like Instagram Live, including the ability to go live with others, host Q&As, use moderators and improved keyword filters, and more.

For viewers, TikTok is also adding new discovery and viewing tools, among other changes.

The company recently teased some of the LIVE updates to creators across social media ahead of today’s announcement.

New LIVE Events features

Introducing 3⃣ new ways for you to connect and create with your community—LIVE Events, go LIVE together & LIVE Q&A ft. matt_and_omar!

Discover more https://t.co/TF8SN89MiS pic.twitter.com/azmZt1OXhV

— TikTok Creators (@tiktokcreators) July 20, 2021

According to TikTok, select markets have already had access to LIVE Events, which is a new tool that lets creators better plan their upcoming LIVE sessions.

Creators can schedule and promote their event in advance to build anticipation across their community, while fans can discover, register, and then get notifications and reminders when the LIVE Event is about to begin. Scheduling tools are a fairly common baseline feature for livestreaming platforms to offer, so it makes sense that TikTok would add this.  

Image Credits: TikTok

To use this feature, creators can select the LIVE Events icon from the top-right corner of their profile page, then name the event, list the start time and write a brief description. Once they hit create, the LIVE event will go through a brief review process before being visible to the rest of TikTok.

After the event is scheduled, creators can share it through in-app messages, promote with a TikTok video using a LIVE countdown sticker or promote it outside of TikTok. They can also make changes or even delete the event. As they plan for their event, TikTok will show how many people have already registered to attend to better inform creators’ promotional efforts.

This feature had already become available in the U.S., Canada, Australia and New Zealand, but is now testing in other global markets, the company said.

Creators can also now go live with others in order to benefit from the combined audience. Currently, the ability to go live with one other co-host is available worldwide, but TikTok is testing going live with multiple hosts in select regions. For comparison, Instagram this year launched the ability for creators to go live with up to four others in Live Rooms.

Meanwhile, TikTok’s LIVE Q&As allow audience members to ask questions during the creator’s livestreams. Creators can view these questions in their stream chat from a separate panel and have the option to show the questions to all viewers and answer them formally through the existing Q&A tools.

Image Credits: TikTok

Another new tool allows creators to assign trusted moderators to manage their streams before a livestream starts. These moderators will have the ability to mute and block users from the chat as needed. The keyword filtering tool, which blocks words the creators don’t want to appear in their chats, has also been expanded to support up to 200 terms.

Over the next few weeks, TikTok will also introduce a way for hosts and moderators to temporarily mute viewers and remove comments.

Image Credits: TikTok

For viewers, meanwhile, TikTok will make it easier to find LIVE videos to watch. Soon, users will be able to tune into LIVE videos directly from the For You Feed and Following pages, by tapping on the new LIVE button, which some may already have, then the “Explore” button, which launches a side panel where they can browse the various LIVE videos available now.

TikTok says the top LIVE categories to date included chat/Q&A, gaming, talents, fashion and daily life.

Viewers will also be prompted to reconsider their comments during the livestream if the system detects they’re about to post something potentially harmful or abusive. TikTok has used prompts before to flag unsubstantiated claims in videos its fact-checkers couldn’t verify and it has used a similar prompt to address potentially bullying comments. 

Image Credits: TikTok

Livestream viewers can also now use picture-in-picture mode on iOS and Android to watch LIVE videos while continuing to use their phone.

The TikTok LIVE experience became particularly popular during the pandemic. And while the company declined to share exact viewer metrics for its livestreams, it said that the number of people going live and the number of people watching LIVE videos had doubled over the last year. These videos may be helping to fuel demand for the app as well, as a recent report from Sensor Tower noted TikTok became the first non-Facebook app to reach 3 billion downloads worldwide, despite being banned in India. 

The report also noted that in Q2 2021 the app saw its greatest quarter-over-quarter growth in consumer spending in a year’s time, climbing 39% to $534.6 million, up from $384.7 million in the previous quarter. This could signal increased interest in livestreams, as that’s where creators tend to generate revenue through virtual gifts.

TikTok’s LIVE platform is only open to users over the age of 16, and it regularly removes those who the system detects may be underage. (Asked about a recent purge, TikTok said it’s just enforcing its existing guidelines.) It also bans accounts that impersonate or mislead the community about their identity, it said.

All of the new features are available, in some form, to global audiences presently.

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Norby raises $3.8M for an all-in-one creator marketing platform

Early in the pandemic, Nick Gerard, Steven Layne, and Samantha Safer Valentine had a hit on their hands. In the era before Zoom fatigue set in, the trio launched Mainstream Live, a website and newsletter that curated live virtual events across platforms and gave people text-based reminders to check them out. 

“We started with the discovery problem of people looking for cool things to do online,” Gerard told TechCrunch. “…Right away we knew that we were tapping into something.” Overnight, tens of thousands of people were on the site, browsing for online events to keep them connected in a period of unprecedented social isolation.

After going viral, the Mainstream Live team found itself inundated with questions about the tools it used to surface events and keep its community in the loop. As the team built more services for its own needs, it eventually opened its custom toolkit, sharing the code to other community leads and content creators who implemented the same set of tools with a rebrand.

“People loved it — more and more people asked for it,” Gerard said. “We got to the point where we were juggling a dozen of [these] for different partners.” By the fall, the team wound down the original community, leaned into the inbound interest in its toolset and built Norby.

The new company rolled together everything that people were asking for: a link-in-bio service, referral tracking, SMS, ticketing and other marketing tools necessary to keep a small brand or creator community humming. 

Gerard says the team at Norby has been “following that signal” ever since. Now, Norby has raised a $3.8M seed round led by Gradient Ventures, Google’s venture AI-focused fund, to grow its team and scale its full-stack marketing platform to new heights. Bungalow Capital, BBG Ventures, Charge VC, and Notation also participated in the funding round. 

Norby’s big idea is to combine services like LinkTree, Eventbrite and MailChimp into a single, affordable, subscription-based service, offering anyone who handles an online community a single solution rather than an expensive patchwork of services that have to be individually set up and managed. Norby is ideal for small brands and solo entrepreneurs and most of its customers run less than 10-person operations. The creator tool suite is purely subscription based and won’t collect any fees like Eventbrite and other popular services.

For brands, it starts at $20 per month and the company has plans in the works for a $5 per month tier for individual use. There’s no free tier, and Gerard prefers to think that Norby’s customers will be excited to save time and money on the company’s bundled offering. “What we found is that people spend an enormous amount of money on these tools,” Gerard said. “We can knock a bunch of tools out of your stack and save you money. But we can also save you time.” 

Norby’s team spends a lot of time talking to creators and small companies. Its customers range from sexual wellness companies to advice columnists and activists — anybody who needs to manage an online community. It counts Sad Girls Club, EVRYMAN and Allbodies among its early customers

The company is growing slowly and organically, bringing new users in through a waitlist and invite system and showing them around the product in group demos. “What’s been really cool for us, we’ll get a new customer for one or two features… then they came into the product and were like ‘oh we’ve always wanted to try SMS’ and then it’s just there and they can start using it,” Gerard said. 

Big picture, Norby views itself as an advocate for creators — and an insulator against the power that big platforms wield. In the long term, Gerard hopes to help creators own their own communities as a kind of “counterbalance” to big platforms like Instagram, TikTok and YouTube.

Norby hopes to help more people make a reliable living creating content and communities online. “There’s a handful of extreme winners and it’s just barren after that,” Gerard said, citing Li Jin’s ideas on building a creator middle class. 

Helping creators “own the relationship” with their communities is something that big platforms will never have an incentive to do. But those same platforms are realizing that creators wield some very real power — and the ability to pick up their content empires and take them to go if they choose to. 

“Whats exciting about this moment is that right now looking ahead to the next five or ten years, nothing is inevitable,” Gerard said. “These windows don’t come along all the time.”

Happs raises $4.7 million for a multicast livestream platform creator community

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Pinterest rolls out new features that let creators make money from Pins

Pinterest today is increasing its investment in the creator community by introducing new tools that will allow creators to make money from their content. Now, creators will be able to tag products in their Idea Pins — a video-first feature the company first launched this spring — to make their content “shoppable.” They’ll also now be able to earn commissions through affiliate links and partner with brands on sponsored content, much like on other social platforms like Instagram, YouTube and TikTok.

Despite its general focus on turning product inspiration into clicks and purchases, Pinterest has been slower to embrace the creator community which today is responsible for driving a significant amount of interest in new products among online shoppers. Over the past several years, brands have increased their influencer marketing budgets from $1.7 billion in 2016 to now $13.8 billion in 2021. However, Pinterest offered few tools for creators to tap into that market on its own site, until its more recent debut of Idea Pins in May.

These Pins are somewhat like Pinterest’s take on TikTok, mixed with Stories, as they offer a way for creators to produce content that combines music, video, and other interactive elements. The videos in Idea Pins can be up to 60 seconds per page, with up to 20 total pages per Pin. Creators can also add other features to their Pins, like stickers or music, and tag other creators with their @username.

Image Credits: Pinterest

While similar in some ways to TikTok, the videos can include “detail pages” where viewers can find associated content, like the ingredient list and instructions for a recipe, or a list of how-to instructions for a craft project.

Now, explains Pinterest, creators will be able to tag products in their Pins, as well. That means fans viewing the Pin content can now go from inspiration to purchase from the Pinterest app. However, the path isn’t as straightforward as it is on Instagram, where a tap on a tag leads you to a page where you can then add an item to a shopping cart. Instead, Pinterest’s product tags tend to take you to another Pinterest page for the product in question, and from there you have to click again to visit the retailer’s website to complete your order.

The company has been testing the feature before today with creators including Olive + Brown, Fall for DIY and UnconventionalSouthernBelle who have already made some of their content shoppable.

The new Idea Pins product tagging tool will roll out to all business accounts in the U.S. and U.K. and will then continue to roll out access over the coming months to international creators.

Image Credits: Pinterest

Other new monetization features rolling out now include support for affiliate programs and brand sponsorships.

Creators will now be able to integrate their affiliate programs for Rakuten and ShopStyle to generate additional revenue from their recommendations. Meanwhile, creators who come to the platform with brand partnerships will be able to use a new tool, still in beta, that will let them disclose those partnerships to their followers.

When they then produce branded content on Pinterest and add the brands to their Idea Pins, the brand will then be able to approve the tag, and the Idea Pin will feature a label that reads “Paid Partnership.”

This paid partnerships tool is now live for select Creators in the U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, France, Spain, Italy Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Sweden, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Chile, Colombia and Peru.

Image Credits: Pinterest

Most of Pinterest’s new monetization tools are not necessarily all that innovative or unique.

Instead, they represent a company that’s playing catch up to larger social platforms — like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, an d YouTube — which have been better catering to creators in recent years by allowing them to build their own businesses on their respective platforms and expand their reach. Instagram, in particular, has moved in on Pinterest’s territory to such an extent that many users today start their shopping inspiration searches on its app first.

And Instagram has catered to this growing group of online shoppers by turning its platform into an online shop of sorts, compete with a dedicated Shop button, built-in checkout features, alerts about product drops, and numerous ways for creators to generate profits from their work.

Now that influencer shopping is the norm, the race is on among large platforms and startups alike to bring a similar set of shopping tools to live streamed video.

Given the significant competition, Pinterest’s pitch to the creator community is that its user base is already primed to shop.

By the end of 2020, the company says it saw a 20x increase in product searches on its platform. It also notes that Pinterest users are 89% more likely to exhibit shopping intent on products tagged in creators’ Idea Pins than on its standalone Pins. Plus, the company says that its focus will be more on inspirational content, rather than “influence and entertainment” — a seeming knock at social media and its influencer stars.

“Pinterest is the place where creators with inspiring and actionable ideas get discovered. With this latest update, we’re empowering Creators to reach millions of shoppers on the platform and monetize their work,” said Pinterest Head of Content and Creator Partnerships, Aya Kanai. “Creators deserve to be rewarded for the inspiration they deliver to their followers, and the sales they drive for brands. Creators are central to our mission to bring everyone the inspiration to create a life they love, and we’ll continue working with them to build their businesses and find success on Pinterest,” she added.

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Instagram to default young teens to private accounts, restrict ads and unwanted adult contact

As it gears up to expand access to younger users, Instagram this morning announced a series of updates designed to make its app a safer place for online teens. The company says it will now default users to private accounts at sign-up if they’re under the age of 16  — or under 18 in certain locales, including in the E.U. It will also push existing users under 16 to switch their account to private, if they have not already done so. In addition, Instagram will roll out new technology aimed at reducing unwanted contact from adults — like those who have already been blocked or reported by other teens — and it will change how advertisers can reach its teenage audience.

The most visible change for younger users will be the shift to private accounts.

Historically, when users signed up for a new Instagram account, they were asked to choose between a public or private account. But Instagram says that its research found that 8 out 10 young people selected the “private” option during setup, so it will now make this the default for those under the age of 16.

Image Credits: Instagram

It won’t, however, force teens to remain private. They can switch to public accounts at any time, including during signup. Those with existing public accounts will be alerted to the benefits of going private and be instructed on how to make the change through an in-app notification, but Instagram will not force them to go private, it says.

This change follows a similar move by rival platform TikTok, which this January announced it would update the private settings and defaults for users under the age of 18. In TikTok’s case, it changed the accounts for users ages 13 to 15 to private by default but also tightened other controls related to how young teens use the app — with comments, video downloads, and other TikTok features, like Duets and Stitches.

TikTok update will change privacy settings and defaults for users under 18

Instagram isn’t going so far as to restrict other settings beyond suggesting teens’ default account type, but it is taking action to address some of the problems that result from having adults participate on the same app that minors use.

The company says it will use new technology to identify accounts that have shown “potentially suspicious behavior” — like those who have been recently blocked or reported by other young teens. This is only one of many signals Instagram uses to identify suspicious behavior, but the company says it won’t publicize the others, as it doesn’t want people to be able to game its system.

Once identified as “potentially suspicious,” Instagram will then restrict these adults’ accounts from being able to interact with young people’s accounts.

For starters, Instagram will no longer show young people’s accounts in Explore, Reels or in the “Accounts Suggested For You” feature to these potentially suspicious adults. If the adult instead locates a young person’s account by way of a search, they won’t be able to follow them. And they won’t be able to see comments from young people on other people’s posts or be able to leave comments of their own on young people’s posts.

(Any teens planning to report and block their parents probably won’t trigger the algorithm, Instagram tells us, as it uses a combination of signals to trigger its restrictions.)

These new restrictions build on the technology Instagram introduced earlier this year, which restricted the ability for adults to contact teens who didn’t already follow them. This made it possible for teens to still interact with their family and family friends, while limiting unwanted contact from adults they didn’t know.

Instagram adds new teen safety tools as competition with TikTok heats up

Cutting off problematic adults from young teens’ content like this actually goes further that what’s available on other social networks, like TikTok or YouTube, where there are often disturbing comments left on videos of young people — in many cases, girls who are being sexualized and harassed by adult men. YouTube’s comments section was even once home to a pedophile ring, which pushed YouTube to entirely disable comments on videos featuring minor children.

Instagram isn’t blocking the comments section in full — it’s more selectively seeking out the bad actors, then making content created by minors much harder for them to find in the first place.

The other major change rolling out in the next few weeks impacts advertisers looking to target ads to teens under 18 (or older in certain countries).

Image Credits: Instagram

Previously available targeting options — like those based on teens’ interests or activity on other apps or websites — will no longer be available to advertisers. Instead, advertisers will only be able to target based on age, gender and location. This will go into effect across Instagram, Facebook and Messenger.

The company says the decision was influenced by recommendations from youth advocates who said younger people may not be as well-equipped to make decisions related to opting out of interest-based advertising, which led to the new restrictions.

In reality, however, Facebook’s billion-dollar interest-based ad network has been under attack by regulators and competitors alike, and the company has been working to diversify its revenue beyond ads to include things like e-commerce with the expectation that potential changes to its business are around the corner.

In a recent iOS update, for example, Apple restricted the ability for Facebook to collect data from third-party apps by asking users if they wanted to opt out of being tracked. Most people said “no” to tracking. Meanwhile, attacks on the personalized ad industry have included those from advocacy groups who have argued that tech companies should turn off personalized ads for those under 18 — not just the under-13 crowd, who are already protected under current children’s privacy laws.

At the same time, Instagram has been toying with the idea of opening its app up to kids under the age of 13, and today’s series of changes could help to demonstrate to regulators that it’s moving forward with the safety of young people in mind, or so the company hopes.

Consumer groups and child development experts petition Facebook to drop ‘Instagram for kids’ plan

On this front, Instagram says it has expanded its “Youth Advisors” group to include new experts like Jutta Croll at Stiftung Digitale Chancen, Pattie Gonsalves at Sangath and It’s Okay To Talk, Vicki Shotbolt at ParentZone UK, Alfiee M. Breland-Noble at AAKOMA Project, Rachel Rodgers at Northeastern University, Janis Whitlock at Cornell University, and Amelia Vance at the Future of Privacy Forum.

The group also includes the Family Online Safety Institute, Digital Wellness Lab, MediaSmarts, Project Rockit and the Cyberbullying Research Center.

It’s also working with lawmakers on age verification and parental consent standards that it expects to talk more about in the months to come. In a related announcement, Instagram said it’s using A.I. technology that estimates people’s ages. It can look for signals like people wishing someone a “happy birthday” or “happy quinceañera,” which can help narrow down someone’s age, for instance. This technology is already being used to stop some adults from interacting with young people’s accounts, including the new restrictions announced today.

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