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founder-led marketing ideas book a callSocial Media Update Trends – 1st Week of January , 2026 Youtube Update YouTube Looks To Streamline Sponsored Content Partnerships [1 ] YouTube is changing its sponsored-content tools to make it easier for creators and brands to work together. The main idea is to reduce extra messages and manual sharing of results.
The biggest update is a rename: YouTube is calling its brand-initiated video linking “Brand Partner Access.”[2 ] When a creator approves a brand, that brand can see more detailed performance data for the sponsored video.
With this access, brands can also use the creator’s sponsored video as an ad inside broader paid campaigns across YouTube and Google.
Creators can still mark a video as sponsored during upload, which adds a “Paid promotion” label on the video. YouTube also notes these partnership ads can appear with overlays on Shorts that connect to a brand promotion.
The article says this is not a huge new invention similar tools existed before but the process is now more direct and transparent. YouTube positions it as part of a wider effort to help creators earn more from brand deals (including its recently launched Media Kit [3] PDF feature for sharing channel stats). Key points YouTube renamed the feature to Brand Partner Access . Approved brands can view full performance metrics for sponsored videos. Brands can run creator videos as partnership ads on YouTube and Google. Creators can label uploads as sponsored with a “Paid promotion” tag. The aim is to save time and avoid manual sharing (like analytics screenshots). Instagram Update IGTV Is Back, With an Instagram Reels TV App [ 1 ] Instagram is testing a new TV app that brings Reels to the big screen, which some commentators are jokingly describing as “IGTV coming back,” IGTV app [2] even though it is a different product concept. The app is designed for “lean-back” viewing in the living room, starting as a pilot on Amazon Fire TV devices in the U.S. TechCrunch The experience is built around quick, channel-like browsing, similar to how people flip through TV channels. Instagram’s goal is to make it easier to watch Reels with other people in the room (not just share them in DMs), while also competing more directly with YouTube’s strong position on TV screens [3] [4]. TechCrunch Key parts of the TV app include: TechCrunch+2The Verge+2 Personalized Reels feed based on what you watch and who you follow Channels/categories (e.g., comedy, music, sports, travel) to browse by interest Autoplay viewing with the option to skip to the next Reel Ability to like, view comments, and reshare from the TV interface Support for up to five accounts on one device so different household members can get their own recommendations Visually, the app uses a TV-friendly layout: horizontal rows of Reels to browse, then a full vertical Reel view when you select one, with captions and eng