This is the first installment in an ongoing series of monthly updates on the major social media platforms. The goal of each update is to provide a summary of key developments and what they mean for marketers.

Last month, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg sat through a congressional hearing over the company’s Libra cryptocurrency efforts, Instagram launched a standalone messaging app for users, and Twitter banned political advertising on its platform—and that was just a tiny portion of what made the news.

eMarketer senior forecasting analyst Oscar Orozco shares our latest ad spend estimates for Instagram and the platform’s focus on opening new ad inventory.

TikTok, the Chinese short-video app, is taking off in the US, India and elsewhere. It offers many unique marketing opportunities, such as the Hashtag Challenge, but marketers should take note of some risks.

eMarketer vice president of forecasting Monica Peart shares our digital ad spend estimates for the Google-Facebook duopoly and the reasons behind our recent forecast adjustments.

Ads on WhatsApp are to be expected sometime in 2020. And most advertisers we spoke to for our new report on global messaging apps agreed that Status—WhatsApp’s version of Stories—makes sense as a testing ground for ads.

eMarketer forecasting director Shelleen Shum breaks down Facebook’s average ad revenues per user in the UK, including Instagram.

Creators are all over the news, but are they different from influencers? While it’s easy to say yes, it’s hard to say why. For our latest report, “Video Ads in Social Media 2019,” we explored how the two are differentiated.

eMarketer junior analyst Blake Droesch explains Facebook’s mass app removal, new ad initiatives and hiding likes. He also discusses Twitter’s controversial “hide replies” feature, Snapchat increasing the length of video ads and more.

Digital and mobile video viewership, adoption of subscription over-the-top (OTT) services and video ad spending are on the rise throughout the world as audiences, programmers and advertisers continue to shift focus from traditional to digital platforms.

Ad dollars and viewers are pouring into digital video platforms as the TV industry continues to lose subscribers.

For hotel marketers, Facebook continues to be the most effective advertising platform for targeting new audiences and driving brand awareness, according to research from travel industry ad platform Sojern.

Advertising is the core of Facebook’s business, so it was only a matter of time before the company found a place to show ads on WhatsApp. That place will be in Status, WhatsApp’s version of Stories on Facebook, Instagram and Messenger.

YouTube has been the OG for video creators for years, but now the social properties are making bigger inroads into this popular content format. That’s bringing new ways for marketers to work with creators on Facebook, Snapchat, TikTok and more.

Measuring attribution and return on investment remains a key challenge when marketing with influencers—which means that it can be hard to quantify the merits of utilizing them. But neuroscience research from the UK, showing cognitive responses to traditional marketing vs. influencer posts, may provide some answers.

Adopting new technology is the norm among Generation X, and unlike digital natives, this adoption hasn’t crowded out old media. But before marketers can tap into Xers’ widespread accessibility, they should understand their unique device and media usage, social platform preferences and privacy concerns.

eMarketer senior forecasting analyst Cindy Liu breaks down our Facebook audience numbers for key age groups and a silver lining for the social network.

eMarketer junior forecasting analyst Nazmul Islam breaks down TV’s share of the total video ad market in Canada and why budgets are flowing to competitors like YouTube and Instagram. Watch now.

eMarketer principal analyst Debra Aho Williamson and senior analyst Jasmine Engberg discuss key takeaways from Facebook’s and Twitter’s Q2 earnings. They also chat about the new Facebook antitrust probe, what impact hiding likes will have for Instagram and what people think of Facebook’s new Libra cryptocurrency.

eMarketer senior forecasting analyst Cindy Liu discusses our usage numbers for Instagram in Brazil and what’s driving its popularity. Watch now.