Global Social Ad Spend Doubles
According to Socialbakers’ Q3 Social Media Trends Report, global social media ad spend increased by 56.4% in Q3 versus Q2. North America led the trend with a 61.7% spend increase, whilst the UK’s spend went up 43%.
Brands have also spent more in Q3 2020 than they did in Q3 2019. The most significant increases in spend were seen amongst the auto (up 59.4%), finance (up 35.3%) and e-commerce (up 27.5%) industries.
Perhaps this rise in spend is a prime example of why “When times are good, you should advertise. When Times are bad, you must advertise.”
Research Finds AI ‘See’ Objects in the Same Way as Humans
Scientists at Johns Hopkins University have discovered a “spooky correspondence” between how human brains and artificial intelligence computers see three-dimensional objects.
The researchers found that when processing 3D shape fragments, nearly identical responses were found between humans and AI; despite artificial neurons being trained using two-dimensional images. They noted that as one is a product of thousands of years of evolution and lifetime learning, and the other is designed by computer scientists, the technology is the best model so far at assisting in understanding the brain – and vice versa.
WhatsApp Introduces New Business Tool
Recent buyer trends have seen people move to messaging companies they are dealing with directly, over traditional means of getting in touch with businesses. WhatsApp wants to diversify to account for this, by introducing new features to their messaging app in the upcoming months:
Shopping Tools
These tools will allow users to purchase items through the app. Stores can host a devoted page to show the products they’re selling, and customers can then purchase them in the same way as sending a message. They can also discuss any questions they may have through the same means.
Facebook Hosting Services
SMEs will be able to have their ‘tools’ hosted by Facebook itself, rather than having to integrate WhatsApp’s technology with their own systems. Meaning Facebook will be able to gather data about what customers are buying and discussing within the app. Some of the information generated through the integration with Facebook will be used for ad targeting too.
Amazon Uses AR and Machine Learning to Improve its Search
Amazon has announced plans to use machine learning to make their search bar ‘smarter’, with the addition of more personalised and context-aware features.
Amazon is testing a number of features in order to achieve this; including product images, augmented reality, better understanding of queries, and additional Amazon Prime links following autocompleted suggestions.
It’s rumoured the searches will begin to present brand pages and targeted ads. As if Amazon Prime didn’t make shopping easy enough already!!
New Magento Version Released
This month Adobe released new versions of Magento Commerce and Open Source to increase product security, performance and functionality.
The update included CAPTCHA for improved security to payment information, as well as added cookie attribute support to comply with Google's recent changes to how its browser handles third-party cookies.
Take a look at the full details of the Open Source update here.
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