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It’s National 🙋 True Confessions Day, Reader! Here’s one for you: Our Director of Editorial has never seen an episode of Friends 🤯.

In today’s edition:

• Today's 👉 Tip of the Day is for Instagram

• Proven tips for growing and marketing a 🔑 membership product

• More 🔊 ads options on LinkedIn

• 📲 Instagram Spins in development

• 🕰️ TikTok Sounds for Business

• 📣 Additional industry news from TikTok and YouTube

Ever wish you could get a second chance at engaging people on Instagram without reposting?

Count on Carousel Posts

Carousel posts are the only type of content on Instagram the platform will show to each user twice. 

When first shown to a viewer, your carousel displays the first slide. If they scroll past your carousel without tapping to scroll, Instagram will show it a second time but display the second slide! 

You get two chances at engaging someone with a single post. Just make sure those first two slides are chosen with care.

Today's tip is inspired by Chelsea Peitz, a featured speaker in the Social Media Marketing Society.

Curious How Social Media Examiner Does Marketing?

We hear it all the time. Marketers love to hear how other businesses do what they do.

That’s why we just published, Behind the Scenes: How Social Media Examiner Does Marketing.

You'll learn a lot about how we've evolved our marketing for the Social Media Marketing Society. There are some really powerful gems we’ve learned. 

Watch it on YouTube or listen to the Social Media Marketing Podcast episode.

BTS: How to Successfully Market a Membership Product

Social Media Examiner has been running a successful membership product called the Social Media Marketing Society for nearly nine years. 

Marketing a membership product requires continual adaptation and evolution. By staying attuned to our audience's needs, experimenting with pricing and positioning, and highlighting the value of community, we have kept the Social Media Marketing Society going strong for nearly a decade. 

You can apply the following tips to many types of membership products to help attract and retain subscribers:

Employ Affordable Pricing and Scarcity

When the Society first launched, we focused on making the membership affordable at just $30 per month. The value proposition was simple: training. We employed a scarcity concept, treating it like a private school with limited enrollment periods. This created a sense of urgency and FOMO (fear of missing out) for potential members.

Introduce Annual Plans

As the membership grew, we realized we needed to address churn due to members canceling their subscription. We found that people on monthly plans often didn't get enough value in the first month or two to justify continuing. To solve this, we introduced a discounted annual plan alongside a more expensive monthly option. This encouraged more people to commit to a full year, giving them time to fully experience the benefits of the membership.

Adapt to a Changing Landscape

Over the years, the social media marketing space has evolved significantly. We’ve had to adapt the Society to stay relevant to our audience's changing needs and interests. We expanded our training topics to include things like marketing strategy, email marketing, and artificial intelligence.

We also faced growing competition from other membership sites, online courses, and free content on platforms like YouTube. To stand out, we began emphasizing the community aspect of the membership, not just the training.

Revamp the Pricing Structure

Recently, we made some big changes to our pricing:

1. We eliminated the monthly plan and introduced a quarterly subscription alongside the annual option. This gives new members a few months to engage with the membership before deciding to renew.

2. We established a higher retail price for the quarterly and annual plans. However, during specific promotional periods, we offer significant discounts, making the membership much more affordable.

3. We decided to open enrollment year-round rather than having limited windows. This makes it easier for people to join when they're ready, not when the company dictates.

Migrate to a New Community Platform

We also decided to move away from Facebook Groups and launch our own community platform. This gives us more control over the experience and allows for features like searchable member directories, breakout discussion rooms, and direct Zoom integration for meetups and live sessions.

Update the Marketing Messaging

Finally, we refreshed our marketing copy to focus more on the community aspect and the benefits of joining. We now use language that presupposes the reader will become a member, like "when you're a member..." instead of "if you become a member..." This subtle change can have a powerful psychological impact.

We also aim to use warmer, more inviting language, moving away from aggressive "pain point" style copy. The goal is to help potential members envision how the membership can help them navigate the ever-changing world of social media marketing.

Today's advice is provided with insights from Ali Kelly and Michael Stelzner.

🗞 Instagram Spins: Instagram confirmed it is developing a new feature for Reels, its short-form video platform, called "Spins." This feature, which is still an internal prototype and not yet being tested externally, would allow users to swap out the text or audio in other users' Reels. The purpose of Spins is to enable users to create trending templates that others can customize and share, potentially reaching a wider audience. According to a screenshot, creators would receive credit for their original Reels each time someone creates a Spin of it. There is no timeline on when or if Instagram plans to launch the feature publicly. Source: TechCrunch

🗞 LinkedIn Thought Leader Ads Expand: LinkedIn has announced an expansion of their Thought Leader Ads format, allowing companies to promote content from any member, not just employees, for Pages they manage. To set up a Thought Leader Ad, brands will log into Campaign Manager and search for the person (by name) or post (by URL) they want to sponsor. The search will provide a list of posts from that member that the brand can choose to sponsor. The expanded Thought Leader Ads format will be available globally by the end of March 2024. Source: LinkedIn

🗞 TikTok Creator Search Insights: Available in select regions, this tool will surface topics that are often searched for, which can be sorted by category (e.g., tourism, sports, science) or "For You" (topics related to the type of content the creator makes). Creators can also filter for content gap topics, which are frequently searched for but not featured in many videos on TikTok. If needed, creators can remove and report search topics by long-pressing the topic they want removed. Additionally, search value will now be incorporated into the Creator Rewards Program, meaning that creating content related to in-demand search topics will improve the search value of a creator's content. To access Creator Search Insights, creators can type "Creator Search Insights" in the search bar, and it will soon be available directly from Creator Tools in Settings. Source: TikTok

🗞 TikTok Sounds for Business – Voice Clips: To help brands create sound-rich content more easily, TikTok has introduced "Sounds for Business – Voice Clips," a collection of 18 custom voiceover audio templates recorded by popular TikTok creators such as Anania, Matt Buechele, Devin Halbal, Good Children, Sani Sisters, and Very Gay Paint. Creators can also use these free tracks effectively with Spark Ads. Source: TikTok

🗞 More YouTube Creator Tools: YouTube is launching several new features and updates. First, the "Known Issues" filter chip is coming to Studio mobile. Second, a new feature will allow creators to find all viewer-made clips of their videos on the Clips Library page; creators can manage all clips made on their videos in YouTube Studio on desktop, with mobile Studio coming soon. Lastly, creators will now see a banner in video details if products are tagged but can't be served because of tag quality issues, products under review, products that have not been approved, or products that have been deleted. Source: YouTube

Did You Know?

The lemon is a hybrid fruit. It’s a cross between a sour orange and citron.