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Snapchat has released two new features, one that allows users to video chat with up to 16 friends and another that provides the option to tag users in Stories. While Instagram already offers the latter feature, Snapchat has beat its chief rival to the video chat space…at least for now. One thing’s for sure: This arms race is far from over.

Employee experience has emerged as a key focus for companies seeking to improve strategy execution and financial results. What are the best ways to improve the employee experience and measure it? Institute of PR Measurement Commission member Patricia Bayerlein provides tips.

How do you grow an audience? In social media you post content to raise brand awareness. Kylie Cosmetics, Kylie Jenner’s company, writes its own rules. It increased the amount of content on its site by 1 percent from 2016 to 2017. It grew its audience 129%.

Created early in March, global communications agency Burson Cohn & Wolfe (BCW) unveiled its Asia-Pacific leaders as we went to press. Matt Stafford, president, Asia Pacific, BCW, said the merged firm’s Asia market leaders are in place and “most of our teams have already begun to move into the same office.”

We know that we should eat healthier and exercise more, but the vast majority of us do not. New surveys show people lack trust in Facebook’s handling of their personal information. Does this mean they’ll no longer use it as much? And what does a reduction in trust mean for a brand? We tackle these and other questions.

April Fools’ Day saw brands execute countless pranks on their (mostly) unsuspecting audiences. Embedded in these pranks are numerous lessons in good humor and bad taste, reminding communicators that it’s OK to be funny…just so long as the jokes land. Here are some notable examples.

The U.S. public is feeling empowered to use social media to document or talk about a company’s wrong doing. The latest target seems to be Fox News Channel’s Laura Ingraham, whose taunting of a Parkland student on Twitter sent one dozen brands fleeing from her show. A question for brand communicators: How do you protect your company’s reputation in this fast-moving name and shame environment? APCO’s Katie Sprehe has several suggestions.

Following a data breach by an unknown party in February, Under Armour—MyFitnessPal’s parent company—released an email on March 29 notifying users of the incident. In the email, Under Armour explained that the hack was initially discovered on March 25, and “the affected information included usernames, email addresses, and hashed passwords—the majority with the hashing function called bcrypt used to secure passwords.”

Advertisers are fed up with inconsistent reporting and lack of insights into the value of ad spending. This consistent complaint about ads extends to media coverage and social media. Most measurement firms fail to disclose how they arrive at the effectiveness of their metrics. A former communications head at UBS Canada Graeme Harris argues industry needs to devise a meaningful measurement standard.

PR News’ just-launched Data Dynamos program will shine a spotlight on under-the-radar communicators who are excelling at using data to craft new or refine existing initiatives. We present here the initial class of Data Dynamos, who will be celebrated during a luncheon ceremony at PR News’ 2018 Measurement Conference (April 17-18 in Philadelphia).