Social Media Newsfeed: A Very Good Day for Twitter | Instagram Launches Bolt Overseas

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Twitter Q2 Earnings: 271 Million Monthly Active Users, $312 Million Revenue, $0.02 EPS (AllTwitter)

Twitter’s second quarter earnings for 2014 are out, and they’ve beaten expectations across the board. The big number: Twitter now has 271 million monthly active users (MAU), a net gain of 16 million on the last quarter and up 24 percent year-on-year. The Wall Street Journal “We made progress on multiple fronts across the business, and our financial performance was truly exceptional,” said chief executive Dick Costolo on a call with analysts. Like Facebook, Twitter is reaping the benefits of consumers’ shift to mobile — and the advertising dollars that follow. The company’s revenue more than doubled to $312.2 million as it rolled out new types of mobile ads, which now make up about 81 percent of total ad sales. The New York Times Growth was driven in part by heavy use of the service by soccer fans around the world during the monthlong tournament, which spanned June and July. Twitter’s results far exceeded Wall Street’s expectations, and the company’s shares rose about 29 percent in after-hours trading. Reuters Twitter, which has battled to reverse a steady decline in its once-heady pace of growth, surpassed targets for virtually every metric Wall Street scrutinizes. Expectations had subsided ever since the company stunned investors in February with disappointingly low user growth. Re/code One of Twitter’s big issues is that its results pale in comparison to social networking behemoth Facebook, which ended its blockbuster Q2 with 1.3 billion monthly users — and nearly $3 billion in advertising revenue. CNBC’s popular “Mad Money” host Jim Cramer underscored the sour investor sentiment about Twitter in recent weeks: “Frankly, I wouldn’t recommend buying Twitter until it drops back to $29, a huge decline from these levels. Until then, just stick with Facebook.”

Hands on with Bolt, Instagram’s Snapchat Competitor (The Next Web)

Instagram Bolt launched Tuesday with a catch; you have to be in New Zealand, South Africa or Singapore to install. An unusual rollout strategy, but it’s the first time I’ve ever been in one of the first countries for an app like this!

Weddings are Becoming a Social Media Affair [Infographic] (SocialTimes)

Weddings have always been a social affair, and now they have become a social media affair. According to a survey from Mashable and TheKnot.com, the wedding experience is becoming more and more digital.

Walmart Gently Places Pillow Over Luvocracy’s Face (VentureBeat)

Walmart Labs, the retail giant’s technology-focused research-and-development division, is acquiring social shopping site Luvocracy for an unnamed sum, according to a blog post. Luvocracy developed a social graph built on top of an e-commerce shopping engine.

Study: Retargeting on Facebook Leads To Higher CTR, Lower Mobile CPM (AllFacebook)

A new study by AdRoll, a Facebook Exchange partner, showed that by using both FBX and Website Custom Audiences, the CPM of News Feed ad impressions on mobile was 57 percent lower than desktop, generating a 10 percent higher click-through rate. It led to a 61 percent lower cost-per-click for News Feed ads on mobile compared to desktop.

Facebook Gifts is Laid to Rest (CNET)

Facebook already wounded its Gifts service last year when it stopped selling physical goods and went with only gift cards, and now it’s letting the entire feature go to the grave. The social network confirmed Tuesday that Gifts will be no more.

Comedy Central Announces Tweet-Based Digital Improv Series ‘CC:Social Scene’ (LostRemote)

Comedy Central this week announced a new weekly digital series, “CC:Social Scene,” which will feature improv talent reacting to tweets. The initial run will consist of six episodes and will be hosted by comedian Paul Scheer.

#HowManyIsTooMany? Tallying Up One Day’s Worth of Hashtags (The Wall Street Journal/Digits)

Is anyone actually quipping on Twitter about company-promoted hashtags? I tried to find out. On a recent Sunday, I took note of every hashtag I could find during the course of an otherwise typical weekend day. Then I checked Twitter to see who was talking about it.

Yarnee: Gather Your Social Media Content in Collections on iPhone (Inside Mobile Apps)

Danke Games has announced the release of its newest iOS app, Yarnee, which allows users to create shareable collections of all of the tweets, videos, audio clips and pictures they’ve shared on other social media platforms, but in one place. Instead of this content being buried by the dozens or hundreds of other users someone may follow on Twitter or Instagram, Yarnee’s goal was to make content easy to view and share in one place without searching for it after the fact.

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