Coinbase tries to walk back CEO tweets, YouTube the top short-form video content platform and Meta launches Facebook Reels globally

Hello, communicators:

We all know a guy who wears shorts year-round, no matter the weather.

Apparently, all those guys got together and bought up all of Leinenkugel’s latest product—a pair of rechargeable, heated unisex “Shandy Shorts”—in less than two hours earlier this week.

The shorts, which work like a heated blanket, are a promotion for the brand’s seasonal Summer Shandy beverage, which returns to stores this month.

Here are today’s other top stories:

Coinbase attempts to reframe CEO’s tweet on Super Bowl ad

Brian Armstrong, CEO of cryptocurrency exchange platform Coinbase, is in hot water this week after falsely claiming the company’s much-lauded Super Bowl ad was made without any input from an ad agency on Twitter:

1/ Some folks asked for details of how our super bowl ad came to be, here is the quick back story…

— Brian Armstrong (@brian_armstrong) February 21, 2022

Armstrong said the concept for the brand’s unique floating QR code on a blank screen was an “original idea” and avowed that “no ad agency would have done this ad.”

Kristin Cavallo, the CEO of ad agency The Martin Agency, was quick to rebuff these claims in her own series of response tweets:

https://twitter.com/Cavallokristen/status/1495811487897735170

https://twitter.com/Cavallokristen/status/1495812553783525379

Coinbase CMO Kate Rouch took to Twitter to try and walk back Armstrong’s tweets and claimed that his confusion came from being unable to differentiate agency employees from his own team:

Thread 🧵
1/5: Hi @cavallokristen – The Coinbase team and I deeply value our partners. The fit with our creative partner Accenture Interactive (AI) was seamless – so much to that extent our CEO actually thought we were a single team when presenting work.

— Kate Rouch 🛡️ (@kate_rouch) February 22, 2022

Why it matters: C-suite leaders should be active on social media—it helps build visibility and trust in the brand. The danger, of course, comes when top-level execs go rogue.

Because of their outsized visibility, CEOs should be mindful of exactly what they share on social platforms, down to the minutiae of the tone they use to make their claims. PR pros would be wise to share (a reshare) social media guidelines with influential players at their organizations—or risk having to launch a Twitter apology tour when things go wrong.

MEASURED THOUGHTS

Data from a 2021 survey of U.S. social content users shows YouTube is the most popular platform for watching short-form video content, outranking both Facebook and TikTok.

(Image via)

The study characterized short-form video as content that was under 10 minutes in length. Seventy-seven percent of respondents named YouTube as their top platform for shorter videos, followed by Facebook (60.8%) and TikTok (53.9%).

Check out more from the Insider Intelligence chart here.

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Meta launches Facebook Reels globally with more ad opportunities

Meta announced this week it will expand its short form video feature, Reels, to Facebook in more than 150 countries. The Facebook feature launched in the U.S. in September of 2021.

Reels, originally housed on Instagram, is Meta’s answer to TikTok. It allows users to shoot, edit and post short videos to their feeds and offers a Reels homepage for discovering more creators and videos.

From the press release:

We’re creating a variety of opportunities for creators to earn money for their reels. Our Reels Play bonus program, part of our $1 billion creator investment, pays eligible creators up to $35,000 a month based on the views of their qualifying reels. These bonuses have helped creators like Jason the Great fund their reels creation and better understand what types of content works on Facebook. In the coming months, we’ll expand the bonus program to more countries, so more creators can get rewarded for creating reels that their communities love.

Additionally, Meta said, it is testing a semi-transparent overlay advertising feature to allow creators to earn a portion of the ad revenue.

What it means: Influencer marketing has been big for a while, but Meta’s attempt to broaden the reach of its version of TikTok means more opportunities for individual creators—and brands. PR pros should see the global launch of Facebook Reels as an opening to reach audiences with short-form video who are not using TikTok, (e.g., older demographics).

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