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FridaySocial: US Election, Kensington Palace & John Lewis

  • Social Media

Our Friday Social is a weekly round-up of the key social media news stories from the previous seven days. Let us know your thoughts in the comments or via Twitter  – @nathanbrush #FridaySocial

President-elect Donald J Trump

Wow, a result few imagined could ever happen – Donald Trump will be the next president of the United States. As expected, social media has been at the forefront throughout the election.

Trump became a notorious tweeter, regularly publishing outlandish remarks, often in the middle of the night. In the final days of the race, his team even resorted to banning him from using the account. Back in July, Hillary’s team created @hillary_esp – a Spanish Twitter account – in an attempt to connect with Hispanic voters, a demographic which it was thought could ultimately cost Trump the election.

Looking at the stats, Donald triumphed on social media. Out of the half a billion reactions, comments, shares and retweets this year, Trump had the majority. As the race ended, Donald claimed 200 million more engagements and 6 million more followers than Clinton. It is fair to conclude that social media success paved the way to the White House for Trump.

Facebook takes on LinkedIn

Facebook has announced new jobs features in an attempt to challenge LinkedIn’s position as the leading recruitment network. It is testing a ‘Jobs’ tab for brand pages, where admins can post job opportunities and receive applications from candidates.

When a user clicks ‘Apply Now’, a form is pre-populated with information from their profile, making the application process really straightforward. Facebook is also experimenting with ‘profile tags’, similar to LinkedIn endorsements, for users to show off their professional skills.

Kensington Palace issues Meghan Markle statement on Twitter

Two years on from the Queen sending her first tweet, Kensington Palace took to Twitter this week to publish a statement about Prince Harry’s relationship with American actress Meghan Markle.

The statement was very strongly worded, criticising the press and social media trolls for outright sexism and racism, explaining that for Prince Harry and Meghan “this is not a game – it is her life and his.” The Palace was praised by social media users for its “progressiveness” and the “direct nature of its response”.

John Lewis Christmas ad

This year, the anticipation for John Lewis’ Christmas advert was bigger than ever. Early rumours suggested ‘Kevin The Carrot’ was this year’s theme, but he was soon revealed to be the character of Aldi’s festive campaign.

Then the hashtag #BounceBounce appeared on Twitter, along with a series of short video clips, which certainly had the feel of John Lewis’ previous efforts. On Thursday morning, John Lewis ended the suspense and revealed the extremely bouncy Buster The Boxer as the star of their Christmas advert. Nice job!