Everything you need to know about what is going on.
With Mark Zuckerberg’s latest announcements, the grid shifting from 1:1 to 4:5, and TikTok shutting down in the US for less than 24 hours, 2025 has already been a rollercoaster for us digital marketers.
So… TikTok is back.
While it’s fresh in our minds, let’s talk about TikTok. Without giving you the full timeline, in April 2024 the US Government passed legislation against TikTok that was designed to “address legitimate national security and privacy concerns.”
Fast forward to Sunday, our FYP was full of US creators saying their final goodbyes, spilling secrets and reminiscing about the app that changed how we use social media forever (aka shortening our attention span and a major shift to video).
And finally, the app went dark in the US.
Side note: I don’t know about you, but the trend of UK and Aussie users posting that we can now use words like colour, neighbour, behaviour, kilometres, kilograms and Celsius (you get the point) was pure humour.
But blink and you’ll miss it… TikTok is back and we didn’t even get a chance to mourn our favourite creators.
Why, you ask? I woke up thinking the same thing. WARNING: it’s about to get very US politics-y again.
7 hours after TikTok went dark, Trump posted to Truth Social “SAVE TIKTOK.”
3 hours later, Trump announced he would sign an executive order on Monday (inauguration day), delaying the ban 75 days… So we’ll see if, by this Easter Sunday, TikTok has been sold or taken over by a joint venture.
Alas, 12.5 hours after it went dark, TikTok was restored at 12:30 pm EST, January 19.
Luckily, we were asleep for most of that.
Meta is also having a moment.
If you’ve checked out someone’s IG grid lately, you may notice it’s all 4:5, no longer 1:1.
They did a test in 2024 on several accounts (including ours) and obviously, the results were positive.
We like it – it gives your post-previews more real estate on the grid and makes posts stand out more. Just beware, if you’re creating 1:1 graphics, they will now be cropped when on your profile (so just make 4:5).
Is anything else new? Well, yes.
Another warning… the political influence is WILD.
On 7 January 2025, Mark Zuckerberg posted to his personal Instagram page some major updates to the platform’s content policies and monitoring.
Meta has done a bit of a 180 when it comes to content policy and moderation… and we can’t help but see how political this shift is.
Of course, Donald Trump, as of 20 January 2025 is the President of the United States and Meta is doing what it can to be in his good graces.
Fair enough…circle back to earlier when we saw what can happen if your platform isn’t chummy with the US government.
The facts are, that we will see more politics, we will see more hate and we will have to take everything with a grain of salt.
One thing is important to remember… All social media is designed to keep you online longer. So it will feed you content that makes you engage, share and search (including if you don’t like the content).
If you want your feed to be sunshine and rainbows (guilty), just don’t engage with the nasty stuff.
The impact on your business
Your business has its values, and you should keep them. If you want to make political statements, do, if you don’t, don’t.
The guidelines and moderation are becoming less severe, but we still have our national advertising guidelines to follow.
Stay true to your business and adjust the strategy as you usually would. By following the data and overall response to your content.
All these updates are a lot… and can seem like we’re going to have to completely redo our content strategies but that just won’t be the case (at least until the next trend comes along).
Your audience is still the same, if they see value in your content, don’t shift it up on them overnight. As long as your content is authentic to your brand, you’re winning!
