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KIMP’s Picks 12th April: Weekly Highlights In Design, Marketing, AI, & More

Welcome back to KIMP’s Picks! Every week, we bring you a curated selection of the most interesting social media content related to design, marketing, and AI. We sort through the flood of information to find the essential updates you don’t want to miss – from inspiring design ideas to insightful marketing discussions that will boost your campaigns.

Ready to dive into this week’s top social media finds? Let’s get started!

In the Marketing Realm 

McDonald’s takes OOH to the next level 

In a first-of-its-kind marketing stunt, McDonald’s Netherlands launched scented billboards that smell like McDonald’s. Designed to trigger happy memories and cravings, these minimalist red and yellow installations release the iconic McDonald’s scent when people get close. The campaign leverages the power of smell to evoke emotions and remind passersby of good times at McDonald’s. Strategically placed near restaurants, these fragrant billboards are a creative way to lure customers in with a whiff of familiarity.

This OOH campaign has earned the brand a lot of media coverage and below is a post shared by the New York Post discussing this creative effort. 

AR in advertising 

The next post we have is yet another campaign inspiration from a well-known brand – Coca-Cola. The below video released by Coca-Cola introduces their new collaboration with Marvel that incorporates AR (augmented reality) into advertising. 

In this campaign, Coca-Cola is celebrating Marvel’s 85th anniversary with a special edition line of cans and bottles featuring over 30 Marvel characters. But these aren’t just your average collectibles. Consumers can scan the packaging to unlock digital Marvel experiences and enter a sweepstakes for exciting prizes. This interactive campaign highlights Coca-Cola’s long-standing partnership with Disney and their commitment to innovative marketing strategies. Moreover, this campaign also exemplifies the effectiveness of omnichannel marketing. 

Google’s insights for marketers 

Google recently shared some useful insights for marketers working on their 2024 strategies based on tips shared by their media experts. They summarized some of these tips in the below post which also features a link to the detailed post about the rest of the tips. 

The insights discussed here include the widespread use of AI and the changes brought in by Google’s AI solutions. The post also talks about the need for authenticity in modern marketing, the decline of third-party cookies, and other useful pointers for marketers to take away. 

TikTok in small business marketing 

While the future of TikTok in the US remains unclear, here’s a post summarizing the platform’s impact on small businesses. 

A few quick points to take away from this post is that TikTok has been a driving force in the growth of over 7 million businesses with nearly 57% of SMBs attributing their success to the platform. From improving the local reach for Hispanic-owned SMBs to attracting investors for women-owned SMBs, the platform also seems to have played a crucial role in the growth and marketing of various businesses in the US. 

Google is testing a Short Videos menu on mobile 

Google has been continuously revamping its search interface so as to keep up with the changes like AI becoming a crucial tech to focus on and social media platforms slowly becoming search engine equivalents. 

Brodie Clark, an SEO consultant who discusses the latest SEO news and tips shared the below post discussing some more changes that Google is testing. Reportedly, Google is working on introducing a separate menu for Short Videos on their mobile Search menu. And this menu displays short videos shared on YouTube and TikTok. However, there’s no official update on when these changes will be reflected in the Google Search interface for mobile. 

LinkedIn reveals 7 secrets to improved online engagement 

Search Engine Journal, the popular SEO and search marketing news destination, shared the below post summarizing their recent discussion with Prashanthi Padmanabhan, Head of Engineering for LinkedIn Premium. The post lays down some useful insights captured in this discussion about increasing online engagement. 

The post covers some foundational changes like focusing on users’ needs rather than prioritizing trends especially when it comes to choosing the right features to leverage. It also talks about the need to analyze the “why” “what” and “when” in order to create products that resonate with the audience. Furthermore, there are several points about user experience, commitment to improvement, and other strategies that every marketer needs to pay attention to. 

In the Content Marketing Realm 

The most effective content types on LinkedIn 

Struggling with your brand’s LinkedIn marketing strategies? Then the below post shared by Social Media Today is for you. This post discusses a new study that captured some new findings about the most effective post types on LinkedIn. 

This post is particularly handy to marketers because a lot changed on LinkedIn like the end of carousels and the increase in focus on collaborative articles. So, what were some findings from this study? 

  • Multi-image posts generate the most engagement. 
  • Video posts earn the most shares.

And in general, brands seem to be posting more on LinkedIn. So, it’s indeed a good time to invest more time into optimizing your LinkedIn marketing strategies. 

In the Design Realm 

Canva lets you publish your Docs to Web 

Canva started out with pretty basic design editing features for non-designers to quickly retouch their designs. However, the past few years have been different and the platform today caters to both the pros and amateurs in the design realm. 

They recently shared a post that highlights one of the new features added on the platform that lets users to convert their Docs on Canva to a website. With this feature, you can work on your Docs on Canva adding all the tweaks you like including any AI edits. And when sharing the Doc or downloading it, you can directly publish it to a free Canva domain or even add it to an existing domain. The video shared in the post here gives a peek into how to access this feature. 

Adobe shares insights on mood boards 

Do you use mood boards in your design workflow? Then here is a resourceful article from Adobe. Even if you have never used one before but want to, then this article is a good start. 

In summary, a mood board is a summary of all your ideas – a board that captures the outline of the design project including concepts, imagery, text, and other elements that come together in a design. 

The above post from Adobe delves into the basics of mood boards and the procedure to create them as well as 10 effective tips to put together a mood board that enhances your design workflow. Equipped with these ideas you can also begin by exploring some of the mood board templates available on Adobe Express. 

LEGO’s new visual identity 

LEGO has strong branding strategies that have helped the brand become well-loved over the years. 

However, they have not had any other strong visual identity elements to represent the brand. Recently, in collaboration with the branding consultancy, Interbrand, they introduced their new visual identity. 

The visual identity includes the signature elements that have defined the LEGO brands over the years and some comic book-style action graphics too. Creative Boom, the popular art & design magazine spoke about this new visual identity in the below post. 

LEGO landed in hot water recently for the use of AI-generated art that includes elements that violate intellectual property. At such times, news about their refreshed brand identity can be a positive distraction. 

Brand identity design inspiration 

It’s Nice That is a great page for those looking for design inspiration. They recently shared a post discussing the unique brand identity design created for a decades-old baby products brand, GoldBug. 

For brands selling baby products, the visual identity is meant to be playful whereas in this case, there is also the brand heritage to preserve. Therefore, the new brand identity design brilliantly brings both these together to create something lively and memorable. 

The core of this identity lies in keeping things fun – like the peppy illustrated style used for example. Whereas, the identity is also relevant and meaningful – like the stages of a butterfly’s lifecycle used as a reference to represent the various age groups the brand caters to. This shows how adding depth to your design makes the overall identity memorable and easy to relate to. 

The Oreo menus campaign 

Oreo is shaking things up with a clever new campaign that reimagines the universal “hamburger menu” icon on websites. They propose that these three lines actually resemble a stack of their famous cookies – and they’re calling it the “Oreo Menu.” 

Ad Age, the popular online publication talking about advertising and marketing news, shared the below post discussing this creative campaign by Oreo. 

Oreo took a common design element (the hamburger menu) and found a creative way to reframe it for their brand. Look for similar opportunities in your own visual identity. Can you see everyday objects or concepts in a new light that connects with your brand message?

In the AI Realm 

Upgraded GPT-4 Turbo now in API, coming soon to ChatGPT

Not a week passes by without an update from OpenAI. So yes, the first one in this section is an update from OpenAI. 

This week OpenAI has released a major update to their GPT-4 Turbo model, making it even more powerful for developers. This new version boasts “significantly improved” responses and enhanced analysis capabilities, especially when dealing with visual content.

This update, currently available through API, focuses on improving developer workflows and will soon be available on ChatGPT. 

Google unveils code-centric AI model, CodeGemma

Google expands the Gemma family of AI models with two new additions tailored for developers: CodeGemma and RecurrentGemma. 

CodeGemma offers powerful code completion, generation, and understanding for developers. Whereas, RecurrentGemma is designed for researchers and it utilizes a unique architecture to achieve high performance with lower memory usage. 

Along with these updates Google has also announced the Gemma 1.1 update that comes with performance updates. 

Google unveils text-to-live image generation with Imagen 2.0 update

Google is enhancing their Imagen 2.0 generative AI model with new features designed for creative professionals. Users can now generate short, animated images (GIFs) from simple text descriptions. 

Additionally, Imagen 2.0 offers advanced photo editing features like inpainting, outpainting, and digital watermarking, allowing for creative image manipulation and copyright protection. These updates position Imagen 2.0 as a powerful tool for marketing, design, and other creative fields.

Currently, the model lets you create live images at the rate of “24 frames per second (fps) with a resolution of 360×640 pixels and a duration of 4 seconds”. 

Google Workspace gets AI boost with video creation: Google Vids

In the below post, Google spoke about a wave of new updates coming to Google Workspace. One of the most important among them is Google Vids. This is a new AI-powered video creation tool coming to Workspace Labs in June. It allows users to generate storyboards, edit footage, and add voiceover, simplifying video creation for presentations, training, and more.

In addition to Google Vids, Google Workspace is also getting other updates like AI meetings and messaging add-ons and AI security add-ons. Gemini integration with Google Chat and Workspace & Vertex AI integration are the other updates to look out for. 

Meta to release next-gen Llama 3 large language model

TechCrunch recently shared a post discussing the next big thing coming from Meta, Llama 3. Meta is set to release its next-generation large language model (LLM), Llama 3, within the next month. This open-source LLM promises improved capabilities for answering questions, including more controversial topics, compared to previous versions.

Llama 3 aims to compete with OpenAI’s popular ChatGPT and power various Meta products. While details like parameter size and demos are yet to be revealed, Meta emphasizes its commitment to responsible AI development through open-source access. 

Social Media Feature Updates and Algorithm Changes

Messenger gets some fresh updates 

Facebook Messenger is receiving a fresh set of updates to enhance communication and media sharing. You can now send crisper, higher-quality photos by enabling the HD toggle in the chat composer.

The other big change is the support for shared albums. You can create collaborative albums within group chats to share and organize photos and videos around specific events or memories. Participants in the chat can view, add, delete, and download content from the album.

Finally, Messenger now also lets you share documents and media files up to 100MB directly within chats.

Updates coming to Telegram for business users 

Telegram has recently been introducing a host of updates for business users. The next announcement is that business users can now add direct links to chats. These links to chats can be used by business owners for instant chat initiation. 

The link can also pre-populate a suggested message in the chat input field, streamlining communication for users.

This new feature allows businesses to seamlessly integrate Telegram into their websites, marketing materials, and physical locations (through QR codes). It simplifies customer communication and provides a more user-friendly experience for initiating chats with businesses on Telegram.

YouTube’s shopping tools for creators

YouTube is adding a bunch of Shopping updates for creators. One of the first is Shopping Collections. This lets creators curate custom product collections featuring their own merchandise as well as affiliate products. These collections appear in their product list, store tab, video descriptions, and very soon, their channel’s home tab.

Secondly, there is the Affiliate Hub. This lets creators access exclusive promotions, commission rates, and product samples directly within the YouTube app’s Studio section (US only).

Finally, there is product tagging and Fourthwall store integration as well. 

The Bottom Line 

This wraps up our selection of the biggest social media news for this week. We hope these insights sparked your creativity and provided a valuable update on the ever-evolving social media landscape. 

As digital trends continue to shift, KIMP’s Picks will be here to guide you. Stay tuned for the next edition, where we’ll delve into the latest social media developments and equip you with the knowledge to stay ahead of the curve. See you soon!

Posted On

12 Apr, 2024

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