During the session, we covered the following:

News Topics:

• Legitimate negative reviews are now protected by law
  • The Consumer Review Fairness Act went into effect on March 14, and American businesses need to be sure they’re complying with its provisions
  • The ruling exposes user-generated content sites — a category which includes everything from Yelp to Twitter to Backpage to any outlet with a comments section — to legal liability for things users post
• Why Amazon’s Acquisition of Whole Foods Matters for Startupland
  • A leading technology company buying a leader of a traditional industry
  • The $13.7B acquisition underscores the importance of physical retail even to the largest American ecommerce giant
  • Shockwaves reverberating through the grocery industry. Costco fell 10% and Kroger almost 25% on the news
• Instagram Transparency: Enhancing Creator and Business Partnerships
  • Launching this branded content tool (a new “Paid partnership with” tag on posts and stories) is the first step in ensuring transparency of paid partnerships
  • Will help creators more clearly communicate to their followers when they are working in partnership with a business
  • In the coming months, Instagram will be launching an official policy and enforcement for creators to follow based off Facebook’s current practices.
• Apple Rolls Out Analytics to Podcast App
  • Provide basic analytics to podcast creators, giving them the ability to see when podcast listeners play individual episodes, and — crucially — what part of individual episodes they listen to, which parts they skip over and when they bail out of an episode
  • Up until now, Apple has provided almost no data at all about podcast listening behavior
  • If podcast advertisers learn that they’ve been paying for stuff no one hears, they’re likely to stop paying

Lesson of the Week:

• LinkedIn 3rd degree connections
• Interests and Following in LinkedIn Profile
• Snapchat Location Story feature
• New “archive” Feature on Instagram

To learn more about new topics and interesting ideas, see Dean’s Twitter feed.

Remember you can submit all questions in advance of each coaching session by e-mailing our Help Desk.