This curated list includes important digital marketing updates and insights from the month of April. To stay updated on the latest updates from the digital landscape, read our Digital Marketing Apple Page.

Digital Advertisement 

• Facebook will soon enable businesses to create Facebook ads within WhatsApp's business tools. Read more
• Facebook provides advice to developers and advertisers as to how they can prepare for Apple’s iOS 14 changes. Read more
• Google's Insights page is now available to all advertisers globally. Read more
• Facebook launches a global test of In-Stream Video Topics that lets advertisers place ads in certain video topics through Ads Manager. The announcement read

Instagram will also begin testing Reels ads in India, Brazil, Germany and Australia with tests expanding to more countries in the coming months. 

In the coming weeks, we’ll be testing custom Sticker Ads for Facebook Stories, announced in March, with select advertisers and creators. These ads allow creators to monetize their Facebook Stories with ads that look like stickers and receive a portion of the resulting revenue. 

• Google changes how bid strategies are organized for Search campaigns to help advertisers choose the right one. The announcement read 

Going forward, Target CPA and Target ROAS will be bundled with the Maximize conversions and Maximize conversion value bid strategies, respectively. This means that:

Maximize conversions will have an optional target CPA
Maximize conversion value will have an optional target ROAS

• Google Ads lets marketers easily share remarketing lists with their manager account. Read more
• YouTube launches video experiments globally in Google Ads. Read more
• To help advertisers optimize campaigns more efficiently, they now have the option to apply recommendations automatically. Read more
• Google Ads says that it's updating the global site tag (gtag.js) and Google Tag Manager (gtm.js) to set a new same-site cookie on advertisers’ web domains to help improve how it attributes conversions back to ads. Read more
• Google announces the v7 release of the Google Ads API. Read more
• Google Ads makes it easier for advertisers to work with Customer Match lists. Read more
• Google announces plans for a new certification program for health insurance advertisers in the United States. Read more
• Google Ads announces a new feature that will make it easier for advertisers to protect their ads from running alongside content that does not align with their brand or campaign. Read more

Social Media 

• Facebook announces new tools and features to help businesses connect with their customers online and grow more efficiently. The announcement read

Starting in the US, we’re beginning to test a new experience from News Feed where people can tap on topics they’re interested in under posts and ads in Feed, such as beauty, fitness or clothing, and explore content from related businesses.

For the first time, businesses can engage as their business profile, making tasks like commenting, posting and liking as a business easier. With a new dedicated business News Feed, separate from your personal one, businesses can more easily engage with their communities and find relevant content from other businesses.

• Facebook is building a set of new audio creation tools. The announcement read

Through our advances in AI, we can make audio quality magically great — even if you record on a busy street corner. You will be able to use music from Facebook’s Sound Collection in the background of your story to set the tone. And with the ability to mix audio tracks, a growing collection of sound effects, voice effects and filters, it should be a lot of fun too. 

These audio creation tools will enable you to create Soundbites — short-form, creative audio clips for capturing anecdotes, jokes, moments of inspiration, poems, and many other things we haven’t yet imagined. 

We’re also going to start testing Live Audio Rooms and we expect it to be available to everyone on the Facebook app by the summer. 

• Instagram publishes the first edition of its new 'Instagram Insider' digital magazine. Read more
• YouTube publishes a new overview of how its recommendation system works. Watch here
• YouTube is testing new timed comments and different ways to help people assess information online. Read more
• Facebook tests updated up and downvoting for comments in Groups. Read more
• Twitter gives its users the option to upload and view 4K images on Android and iOS. Read more
• Key takeaways and points of feedback from Facebook's Messenger Policy Workshop workshop. Read more
• Facebook will test new ways to get more specific feedback from people about the posts they’re seeing, and will use that feedback to make News Feed better. Read more
• Instagram is working on creator shops and a 'branded content marketplace' for influencers. Read more
• Instagram announces a new way to protect people from seeing abusive DMs in the first place, as well as the ability to prevent someone they've blocked from contacting from a new account. Read more
• Twitter launches an exciting test of a new profile type called Professional Profiles. Read more
• Photos and videos in WhatsApp are now even bigger. Read more
• Instagram chief Adam Mosseri confirms the launch of a new test that will let the IG users choose whether they want to display post Like counts or not.

An update on like counts.

Last year we started hiding like counts for a small group of people to see if it lessens some pressure when posting to Instagram. Some found this helpful and some still wanted to see like counts, in particular to track what’s popular.

— Adam Mosseri (@mosseri) April 14, 2021

Search

• Google rolls out an update to its ranking algorithm in relation to product reviews to better reward in-depth research, rather than thin content that simply summarizes a bunch of products. Read more
• Google launches a new overview of lockdown trends. Read more
• Only 4% of websites achieved a good score in all 3 Core Web Vitals. 96% did not: Google Core Web Vitals Study April 2021. Read more
• Google officially dropped Q&A on Google in search results. Read more
• Google adds a new feature to report an indexing issue directly to their search team. Read more
• To help publishers and site owners improve their page experience, Google announces a few key updates. The announcement read

Gradual rollout starting in mid-June this year
Details on what will be included in the update
A new Page Experience report in Search Console
Support for signed exchanges for all content on Google Search