YouTube Produces 'Shoppable' Videos, Yahoo Buys Tumblr and Google+ Launches Redesign
This week has been very eventful, with announcements coming from Google's I/O conference and the $1.1 billion deal Yahoo signed with media blogging site, Tumblr.
There is never a dull moment in the world of technology and business as brands and icons are ever-evolving, improving and building on previous models and features, not to mention breaking deals.
Google+ announces a dramatic change in the redesign of their page layout, and YouTube creates 'shoppable' videos.
YouTube Makes some Shoppable Videos
The new feature that YouTube has finally released is called a 'channel gadget' and the idea is to incorporate functionality into your own personal video viewing experience. How it all works is that when you are viewing a video you will have the opportunity to connect and purchase an item directly from retailers throughout your viewing experience.
The idea is to shorten the user path and get them directly to the end product as efficiently as possible. When users are watching a video on how to do something and a product is involved, the channel gadget will direct them to the product. The user then has the choice to compare prices, check availability and even perform purchases.
This new shoppable product opens new doors and opportunities for marketers to appeal and engage consumers.
Yahoo's Billion Dollar Deal
Yahoo has been the talk of the week with the billion dollar deal of purchasing popular blogging site Tumblr. The $US1.1 billion deal with Yahoo has been confirmed and is one of the largest for Yahoo since chief executive Marissa Mayer took over last year.
Some have argued that the deal was done simply to make Yahoo look 'cool' due to the popularity the media site has with teenagers, and Tumblr being more popular than Facebook amongst 13-25 year olds. The stats are huge with more than 300 million unique monthly visitors, 120,000 new users each day and 900 posts made per second. The blogging site is one of the fastest growing media networks in the world.
There is no question that the combination between Yahoo and Tumblr will bring an increase in viewers to Yahoo with a growth expected of over 50%, not to mention the growth in traffic to the search engine.
Find out the Latest on Google+
Google+ has a new look and the changes are already here. The new redesign is an exciting change allowing users to interact with others even better than before.
Hashtags allow users to explore and dive deeper into topics that interest them. When a comment or photo is uploaded Google+ is able to look at the hashtag and tag the comment accordingly. The beauty of this is when consumers want to know more about that hashtag or are interested in a topic they can click on it and the card will flip, revealing more relevant information to the user.
Multiple columns in the home page are a new feature. The three columns allow a variety of information to be shown across the page to the user. Larger sized media and animations are only a few of the redesign features.