Weekly Digital Roundup (8.12.13)

Too many brands up in your feed, inbox, and face? This week, we see each channel struggling to keep a comfortable balance for its users and advertisers, and in return, a pushback from both parties. Without further ado, here’s what we found to be the biggest news, so you may comfortably remain snuggled under a rock.

Gmail Throws Down the Gauntlet

Have Gmail's preferred tabs altered email marketing forever? It appears that several brands, like Groupon and Gap, are already grappling for a coveted spot in their customers’ Primary inboxes, rather than being demoted to the Promotions bucket. Here’s a report from MailChimp on how the new setup is affecting open rates.

Reclaiming Twitter, One Ironic Tweet at a Time

Tired of seeing promoted tweets in your newsfeed? Some Twitter vigilantes have taken it upon themselves to fight back by retweeting promoted tweets with nonsensical or ungrammatical comments to reflect poorly on the brand, and potentially drive up the cost of ads. Read more in this article.

Facebook for Business Means Business

You better bookmark the Facebook for Business page—it’s about to get a lot more valuable. At an event this week, Facebook promised to share some precious insights into how its EdgeRank algorithm works, as well as announcing changes to the News Feed. The social network hopes to turn its blog into “the central destination for news, information and inspiration for business on Facebook.”

CMO for FB

Speaking of Facebook, they’ve hired Motorola’s head of Marketing Gary Briggs as the company’s first chief marketing officer. Briggs was brought on to help increase marketing efforts for its products and oversee the teams responsible for product marketing, platform marketing and events, communication design, brand marketing, and content strategy. Big step!

Pinforming You of Updates

Pinterest is adding email alerts to their “rich” pins, which were introduced this past May. Users will receive summarized emails when products they’ve pinned drop in price or go on sale. Another step forward in driving sales through Pinterest, which already drives more referral traffic than Google+, LinkedIn, and YouTube combined.

More Instagrandmas

Social networking is on the up-and-up! A new Pew Research Center report shows that almost three-quarters of U.S. adult Web users are active on social media sites (up 64% from 2004). One of the fastest growing demographics has been the 65 and older crowd, which has tripled their presence in the past four years. Surprised? Learn more.

Happy Monday. Go rock your week!