SEO
5 Types Of Social Media Networks And The Benefits Of Each One
People use social media to share pictures and videos, post updates, and connect with family, friends, and brands.
Likewise, brands use these social media networks to grow their audiences, conduct target market research, and increase platform engagement.
However, as social media evolves, it can be difficult for brands to determine where to focus their attention. And who has the time to engage on all social media platforms and apps effectively? No one.
So then, which ones should your brand use to connect with its audience? Well, that depends on a couple of factors.
Most brands don’t have the resources or, to be honest, the need to be on all social media platforms, sites, and apps.
In this guide, I’ll discuss the evolution of social media and the top social media networks. I’ll also get into the different brand benefits of each network type.
This will help you strategize where to put your focus, what you want to keep in-house, and areas you might want to outsource.
Evolution Of Social Media
Social media platforms have become an integral part of today’s marketing atmosphere.
They play a significant role in businesses connecting and engaging with current and potential customers.
From sharing information to building relationships, these platforms provide endless opportunities.
When you think of social media, you probably think of the top ones, such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter – and you likely lump them together.
But even among these major social media platforms, there are subtypes.
Learning each platform’s different features and potential opportunities can help brands create a more effective social media marketing strategy.
So let’s begin with the old-school platforms. LinkedIn and Facebook (originally Facemash, but who remembers that) launched in 2003.
Twitter followed shortly after that in 2006.
The second wave brought Instagram and Pinterest in 2010. Pinterest’s growth started slow before gaining more traction – today, the platform has over 86 million followers in the U.S. alone
Then, what some consider the first iteration of TikTok – Vine – launched in 2013.
Vine’s surge in popularity was short-lived, as the platform shut down in 2017. But that doesn’t mean we didn’t learn about where people’s attention lies: short-form videos.
Social Media Today
As we see today, social media networks have been competing to keep up with each other and adding more features to keep people on their platforms.
For example, we saw this when Instagram added Instagram Reels to keep up with TikTok.
We also see more platforms, like Twitter, now offering opportunities for its users to go Live.
Now that I’ve covered how platforms compete to evolve and captivate their user’s attention, let’s get into what I mean by a social network.
What Is A Social Network?
A social network is a category or group of a specific type of social media platform or app. There are many types and sub-types of social networks – more than you might think.
I’m sure you’re familiar with specific platforms we’ve already discussed, such as Facebook and Instagram. But what category do these types fall under? And how can your brand best connect with its audience on each?
Next, I’ll break down the following types of social networks and the benefits of each:
- Traditional Social Networks.
- Media Sharing Networks.
- Discussion Networks.
- Social Blogging Networks.
- Review Networks.
1. Traditional Social Networks
- Examples: Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter.
We talked a lot about traditional social networks, so I won’t go too much more into that type.
But, as I talked about, there are some shifting trends in how brands use traditional social networks.
For example, we can see on LinkedIn and Facebook that people often share articles and long-form posts.
This isn’t to say that short-form posts have gone away; we see short-form posts across all traditional social networks.
We can also see that Facebook has evolved to include more engagement options, such as Facebook Marketplace for shopping, Facebook Live, and Facebook Groups.
The platform also serves as a directory for businesses to create a storefront in the form of a Facebook Page to promote their products, book services, message customers, and leave a space for reviews.
Facebook Pages and Groups are great for brands to engage with their audience and reach new people.
LinkedIn, on the other hand, has been a significant player in online professional networking.
These traditional social networks offer opportunities for brands to use ads to target their audience and conduct market research through Insights and analytics tools.
2. Media Sharing Networks
- Examples: Instagram, Pinterest, TikTok.
There are many forms of visual content across media sharing networks, such as infographics, images, and short-form and long-form videos.
While this network type includes video and picture media sharing, most are now multimedia, utilizing audio, video, and pictures.
On Instagram, there are several main ways brands use the platform: video and image sharing on the brand’s profile, then Instagram Stories, IGTV, and Reels.
People use these sites for entertainment, finding information, and sometimes even shopping. This creates ample opportunities for your brand to reach its audience.
Many products have recently gone viral through TikTok. When people can easily purchase through an app, it gives them a direct way to buy before second-guessing.
Brands also use these sites to disseminate how-tos for their products, collaborate with influencers, promote discounts, and more.
When it comes to Pinterest, you can use numerous marketing strategies to grow your brand on the platform.
Visual content is an engaging way to connect with customers and intrigue them to follow and learn more about your brand – and, eventually, buy your products.
Like with traditional social networks, ads perform well on these platforms, especially when brands use insights and analytics to back their strategies.
3. Discussion Networks
- Examples: Discord, Reddit, Quora.
When people have specific questions or want to discuss a topic, sometimes platforms like Facebook or Instagram aren’t the place to go.
There can be many reasons why people view and create content across platforms.
But when it comes to sites like Discord or Reddit, users are typically there for answers and to connect with communities of people with similar interests.
People also tend to go to these platforms for research.
Discussion Networks allow brands to answer questions and connect with their communities.
Discord alone offers opportunities to create customer community groups, events, and live streams.
Sometimes, hopping into a discussion about your brand or industry can help clarify topics and show you’re willing to engage with your audience.
Your effort to meet your audience where they like to communicate can go a long way in creating long-term customers.
4. Social Blogging Networks
- Examples: Medium, Tumblr, Blog Meets Brand.
When a picture or video isn’t the correct form of content for a particular topic, blogs can be an excellent way to share information with your audience.
Sometimes information is better shared through a blog. For example, it may better explain a subject and help readers understand more complex topics.
Blogs are beneficial for content from thought-leaders. They can expand upon important information or news.
Your brand can also repurpose, expand upon, or share what it creates on its site through social blogging networks.
For newer brands, it’s a great way to develop your voice and build your audience.
These are additional platforms, besides their websites, for brands to share their insights on what matters to them and their target audience.
5. Review Networks
- Examples: Yelp, Glassdoor, Google Business Profile, Trip Advisor.
The most important thing for brands regarding review networks is online reputation management.
Quickly responding to both positive and negative reviews – in a polite and empathetic way – is crucial for retaining a positive online reputation.
Reading online reviews has become essential to the customer journey, and your brand should not ignore them.
Claiming listings across various review networks and creating a plan to manage them can help improve your brand’s image. It can also show potential and current customers how your brand responds to critiques.
It can also provide insight into areas of improvement. As a result, it’s an excellent and sometimes underutilized resource.
Check out these Yelp strategies for inspiration on how to optimize your listing.
Reviews are also a critical part of local SEO since when people search locally, they tend to assess the reviews for the businesses in their area before making a purchase.
People often use a mix of Google and Google Maps to find businesses around them. Optimizing your Google Business Profile for local search is essential for reaching more potential customers.
Final Thoughts
Social media has become an overwhelming but incredibly valuable marketing component for brands.
But categorizing the types of social media networks and identifying which ones your brand wants to engage with can help simplify things.
Then, your brand can allocate the right resources, people, and time to create a social media strategy.
Some brands may outsource components of social media management, such as online reputation management, blog writing, social media post creation, ad creation, and customer service across platforms.
After reviewing your brand’s goals, it will be easier to assess which platforms you’ll put effort towards and which are worth skipping, at least for the time being.
More resources:
Featured Image: Khosro/Shutterstock
SEO
4 Ways To Try The New Model From Mistral AI
In a significant leap in large language model (LLM) development, Mistral AI announced the release of its newest model, Mixtral-8x7B.
magnet:?xt=urn:btih:5546272da9065eddeb6fcd7ffddeef5b75be79a7&dn=mixtral-8x7b-32kseqlen&tr=udp%3A%2F%https://t.co/uV4WVdtpwZ%3A6969%2Fannounce&tr=http%3A%2F%https://t.co/g0m9cEUz0T%3A80%2Fannounce
RELEASE a6bbd9affe0c2725c1b7410d66833e24
— Mistral AI (@MistralAI) December 8, 2023
What Is Mixtral-8x7B?
Mixtral-8x7B from Mistral AI is a Mixture of Experts (MoE) model designed to enhance how machines understand and generate text.
Imagine it as a team of specialized experts, each skilled in a different area, working together to handle various types of information and tasks.
A report published in June reportedly shed light on the intricacies of OpenAI’s GPT-4, highlighting that it employs a similar approach to MoE, utilizing 16 experts, each with around 111 billion parameters, and routes two experts per forward pass to optimize costs.
This approach allows the model to manage diverse and complex data efficiently, making it helpful in creating content, engaging in conversations, or translating languages.
Mixtral-8x7B Performance Metrics
Mistral AI’s new model, Mixtral-8x7B, represents a significant step forward from its previous model, Mistral-7B-v0.1.
It’s designed to understand better and create text, a key feature for anyone looking to use AI for writing or communication tasks.
New open weights LLM from @MistralAI
params.json:
– hidden_dim / dim = 14336/4096 => 3.5X MLP expand
– n_heads / n_kv_heads = 32/8 => 4X multiquery
– “moe” => mixture of experts 8X top 2 👀Likely related code: https://t.co/yrqRtYhxKR
Oddly absent: an over-rehearsed… https://t.co/8PvqdHz1bR pic.twitter.com/xMDRj3WAVh
— Andrej Karpathy (@karpathy) December 8, 2023
This latest addition to the Mistral family promises to revolutionize the AI landscape with its enhanced performance metrics, as shared by OpenCompass.
What makes Mixtral-8x7B stand out is not just its improvement over Mistral AI’s previous version, but the way it measures up to models like Llama2-70B and Qwen-72B.
It’s like having an assistant who can understand complex ideas and express them clearly.
One of the key strengths of the Mixtral-8x7B is its ability to handle specialized tasks.
For example, it performed exceptionally well in specific tests designed to evaluate AI models, indicating that it’s good at general text understanding and generation and excels in more niche areas.
This makes it a valuable tool for marketing professionals and SEO experts who need AI that can adapt to different content and technical requirements.
The Mixtral-8x7B’s ability to deal with complex math and coding problems also suggests it can be a helpful ally for those working in more technical aspects of SEO, where understanding and solving algorithmic challenges are crucial.
This new model could become a versatile and intelligent partner for a wide range of digital content and strategy needs.
How To Try Mixtral-8x7B: 4 Demos
You can experiment with Mistral AI’s new model, Mixtral-8x7B, to see how it responds to queries and how it performs compared to other open-source models and OpenAI’s GPT-4.
Please note that, like all generative AI content, platforms running this new model may produce inaccurate information or otherwise unintended results.
User feedback for new models like this one will help companies like Mistral AI improve future versions and models.
1. Perplexity Labs Playground
In Perplexity Labs, you can try Mixtral-8x7B along with Meta AI’s Llama 2, Mistral-7b, and Perplexity’s new online LLMs.
In this example, I ask about the model itself and notice that new instructions are added after the initial response to extend the generated content about my query.
Screenshot from Perplexity, December 2023While the answer looks correct, it begins to repeat itself.
Screenshot from Perplexity Labs, December 2023The model did provide an over 600-word answer to the question, “What is SEO?”
Again, additional instructions appear as “headers” to seemingly ensure a comprehensive answer.
Screenshot from Perplexity Labs, December 20232. Poe
Poe hosts bots for popular LLMs, including OpenAI’s GPT-4 and DALL·E 3, Meta AI’s Llama 2 and Code Llama, Google’s PaLM 2, Anthropic’s Claude-instant and Claude 2, and StableDiffusionXL.
These bots cover a wide spectrum of capabilities, including text, image, and code generation.
The Mixtral-8x7B-Chat bot is operated by Fireworks AI.
Screenshot from Poe, December 2023It’s worth noting that the Fireworks page specifies it is an “unofficial implementation” that was fine-tuned for chat.
When asked what the best backlinks for SEO are, it provided a valid answer.
Screenshot from Poe, December 2023Compare this to the response offered by Google Bard.
Screenshot from Google Bard, December 20233. Vercel
Vercel offers a demo of Mixtral-8x7B that allows users to compare responses from popular Anthropic, Cohere, Meta AI, and OpenAI models.
Screenshot from Vercel, December 2023It offers an interesting perspective on how each model interprets and responds to user questions.
Screenshot from Vercel, December 2023Like many LLMs, it does occasionally hallucinate.
Screenshot from Vercel, December 20234. Replicate
The mixtral-8x7b-32 demo on Replicate is based on this source code. It is also noted in the README that “Inference is quite inefficient.”
Screenshot from Replicate, December 2023In the example above, Mixtral-8x7B describes itself as a game.
Conclusion
Mistral AI’s latest release sets a new benchmark in the AI field, offering enhanced performance and versatility. But like many LLMs, it can provide inaccurate and unexpected answers.
As AI continues to evolve, models like the Mixtral-8x7B could become integral in shaping advanced AI tools for marketing and business.
Featured image: T. Schneider/Shutterstock
SEO
OpenAI Investigates ‘Lazy’ GPT-4 Complaints On Google Reviews, X
OpenAI, the company that launched ChatGPT a little over a year ago, has recently taken to social media to address concerns regarding the “lazy” performance of GPT-4 on social media and Google Reviews.
This move comes after growing user feedback online, which even includes a one-star review on the company’s Google Reviews.
OpenAI Gives Insight Into Training Chat Models, Performance Evaluations, And A/B Testing
OpenAI, through its @ChatGPTapp Twitter account, detailed the complexities involved in training chat models.
Screenshot from X, December 2023The organization highlighted that the process is not a “clean industrial process” and that variations in training runs can lead to noticeable differences in the AI’s personality, creative style, and political bias.
Thorough AI model testing includes offline evaluation metrics and online A/B tests. The final decision to release a new model is based on a data-driven approach to improve the “real” user experience.
OpenAI’s Google Review Score Affected By GPT-4 Performance, Billing Issues
This explanation comes after weeks of user feedback about GPT-4 becoming worse on social media networks like X.
Idk if anyone else has noticed this, but GPT-4 Turbo performance is significantly worse than GPT-4 standard.
I know it’s in preview right now but it’s significantly worse.
— Max Weinbach (@MaxWinebach) November 8, 2023
There has been discussion if GPT-4 has become “lazy” recently. My anecdotal testing suggests it may be true.
I repeated a sequence of old analyses I did with Code Interpreter. GPT-4 still knows what to do, but keeps telling me to do the work. One step is now many & some are odd. pic.twitter.com/OhGAMtd3Zq
— Ethan Mollick (@emollick) November 28, 2023
Complaints also appeared in OpenAI’s community forums.
Screenshot from OpenAI, December 2023The experience led one user to leave a one-star rating for OpenAI via Google Reviews. Other complaints regarded accounts, billing, and the artificial nature of AI.
Screenshot from Google Reviews, December 2023A recent user on Product Hunt gave OpenAI a rating that also appears to be related to GPT-4 worsening.
Screenshot from Product Hunt, December 2023GPT-4 isn’t the only issue that local reviewers complain about. On Yelp, OpenAI has a one-star rating for ChatGPT 3.5 performance.
OpenAI is now only 3.8 stars on Google Maps and a dismal 1 star on Yelp!
GPT-4’s degradation has really hurt their rating. Hope the business survives.https://t.co/RF8uJH1WQ5 pic.twitter.com/OghAZLCiVu
— Nate Chan (@nathanwchan) December 9, 2023
The complaint:
Screenshot from Yelp, December 2023In related OpenAI news, the review with the most likes aligns with recent rumors about a volatile workplace, alleging that OpenAI is a “Cutthroat environment. Not friendly. Toxic workers.”
Screenshot from Google Reviews, December 2023The reviews voted the most helpful on Glassdoor about OpenAI suggested that employee frustration and product development issues stem from the company’s shift in focus on profits.
Screenshots from Glassdoor, December 2023This incident provides a unique outlook on how customer and employee experiences can impact any business through local reviews and business ratings platforms.
Screenshot from Google, December 2023Google SGE Highlights Positive Google Reviews
In addition to occasional complaints, Google reviewers acknowledged the revolutionary impact of OpenAI’s technology on various fields.
The most positive review mentions about the company appear in Google SGE (Search Generative Experience).
Screenshot from Google SGE, December 2023Conclusion
OpenAI’s recent insights into training chat models and response to public feedback about GPT-4 performance illustrate AI technology’s dynamic and evolving nature and its impact on those who depend on the AI platform.
Especially the people who just received an invitation to join ChatGPT Plus after being waitlisted while OpenAI paused new subscriptions and upgrades. Or those developing GPTs for the upcoming GPT Store launch.
As AI advances, professionals in these fields must remain agile, informed, and responsive to technological developments and the public’s reception of these advancements.
Featured image: Tada Images/Shutterstock
SEO
ChatGPT Plus Upgrades Paused; Waitlisted Users Receive Invites
ChatGPT Plus subscriptions and upgrades remain paused after a surge in demand for new features created outages.
Some users who signed up for the waitlist have received invites to join ChatGPT Plus.
This has resulted in a few shares of the link that is accessible for everyone. For now.
Found a hack to skip chatGPT plus wait list.
Follow the steps
– login to ChatGPT
– now if you click on upgrade
– Signup for waitlist(may not be necessary)
– now change the URL to https://t.co/4izOdNzarG
– Wallah you are in for payment #ChatGPT4 #hack #GPT4 #GPTPlus pic.twitter.com/J1GizlrOAx— Ashish Mohite is building Notionpack Capture (@_ashishmohite) December 8, 2023
RELATED: GPT Store Set To Launch In 2024 After ‘Unexpected’ Delays
In addition to the invites, signs that more people are getting access to GPTs include an introductory screen popping up on free ChatGPT accounts.
Screenshot from ChatGPT, December 2023Unfortunately, they still aren’t accessible without a Plus subscription.
Screenshot from ChatGPT, December 2023You can sign up for the waitlist by clicking on the option to upgrade in the left sidebar of ChatGPT on a desktop browser.
Screenshot from ChatGPT, December 2023OpenAI also suggests ChatGPT Enterprise for those who need more capabilities, as outlined in the pricing plans below.
Screenshot from OpenAI, December 2023Why Are ChatGPT Plus Subscriptions Paused?
According to a post on X by OpenAI’s CEO Sam Altman, the recent surge in usage following the DevDay developers conference has led to capacity challenges, resulting in the decision to pause ChatGPT Plus signups.
we are pausing new ChatGPT Plus sign-ups for a bit 🙁
the surge in usage post devday has exceeded our capacity and we want to make sure everyone has a great experience.
you can still sign-up to be notified within the app when subs reopen.
— Sam Altman (@sama) November 15, 2023
The decision to pause new ChatGPT signups follows a week where OpenAI services – including ChatGPT and the API – experienced a series of outages related to high-demand and DDoS attacks.
Demand for ChatGPT Plus resulted in eBay listings supposedly offering one or more months of the premium subscription.
chatgpt plus accounts selling ebay for a premium 🫡🇺🇸 https://t.co/VdN8tuexKM pic.twitter.com/W522NGHsRV
— surya (@sdand) November 15, 2023
When Will ChatGPT Plus Subscriptions Resume?
So far, we don’t have any official word on when ChatGPT Plus subscriptions will resume. We know the GPT Store is set to open early next year after recent boardroom drama led to “unexpected delays.”
Therefore, we hope that OpenAI will onboard waitlisted users in time to try out all of the GPTs created by OpenAI and community builders.
What Are GPTs?
GPTs allow users to create one or more personalized ChatGPT experiences based on a specific set of instructions, knowledge files, and actions.
Search marketers with ChatGPT Plus can try GPTs for helpful content assessment and learning SEO.
Two SEO GPTs I’ve created for assessment + learning 👀👇
1. Content Helpfulness and Quality SEO Analyzer: Assess a page content helpfulness, relevance, and quality for your targeted query based on Google’s guidelines vs your competitors and get tips: https://t.co/LsoP2UhF4N pic.twitter.com/O77MHiqwOq
— Aleyda Solis 🕊️ (@aleyda) November 12, 2023
2. The https://t.co/IFmKxxVDpW SEO Teacher: A friendly SEO expert teacher who will help you to learn SEO using reliable https://t.co/sCZ03C7fzq resources: https://t.co/UrMPUYwblH
I hope they’re helpful 🙌🤩
PS: Love how GPT opens up to SO much opportunity 🤯 pic.twitter.com/yqKozcZTDc
— Aleyda Solis 🕊️ (@aleyda) November 12, 2023
There are also GPTs for analyzing Google Search Console data.
oh wow. I think this GPT works.
Export data from GSC comparing keyword rankings before and after an update and upload it to ChatGPT and it will spit out this scatter plot for you.
It’s an easy way to see if most of your keyword declined or improved.
This site was impacted by… pic.twitter.com/wFGSnonqoZ
— Marie Haynes (@Marie_Haynes) November 9, 2023
And GPTs that will let you chat with analytics data from 20 platforms, including Google Ads, GA4, and Facebook.
Google search has indexed hundreds of public GPTs. According to an alleged list of GPT statistics in a GitHub repository, DALL-E, the top GPT from OpenAI, has received 5,620,981 visits since its launch last month. Included in the top 20 GPTs is Canva, with 291,349 views.
Weighing The Benefits Of The Pause
Ideally, this means that developers working on building GPTs and using the API should encounter fewer issues (like being unable to save GPT drafts).
But it could also mean a temporary decrease in new users of GPTs since they are only available to Plus subscribers – including the ones I tested for learning about ranking factors and gaining insights on E-E-A-T from Google’s Search Quality Rater Guidelines.
Screenshot from ChatGPT, November 2023Featured image: Robert Way/Shutterstock
8 Best Zapier Alternatives to Automate Your Website
Intro to Amazon Non-endemic Advertising: Benefits & Examples
Watch Live on December 11 – WordPress.com News
YouTube Highlights its Top Trends, Topics and Creators of 2023
How to Create a Wholesale Order Form in WordPress (3 Ways)
Mastering The Laws of Marketing in Madness
Critical WordPress Form Plugin Vulnerability Affects Up To +200,000 Installs
12 Holiday Emails for Customers (Templates & Examples!)
8 Super-Helpful AI Features in Google Ads
5 Best Sites To Buy Facebook Likes for Posts & Page (Real & Instant)
-
WORDPRESS5 days ago8 Best Zapier Alternatives to Automate Your Website
-
MARKETING7 days agoIntro to Amazon Non-endemic Advertising: Benefits & Examples
-
WORDPRESS6 days agoWatch Live on December 11 – WordPress.com News
-
SOCIAL5 days agoYouTube Highlights its Top Trends, Topics and Creators of 2023
-
WORDPRESS4 days agoHow to Create a Wholesale Order Form in WordPress (3 Ways)
-
MARKETING6 days agoMastering The Laws of Marketing in Madness
-
SEO6 days agoCritical WordPress Form Plugin Vulnerability Affects Up To +200,000 Installs
-
PPC6 days ago12 Holiday Emails for Customers (Templates & Examples!)
You must be logged in to post a comment Login