The landscape of social media is constantly changing, sometimes even on a minute by minute basis. It’s no wonder that businesses can find it completely overwhelming when it comes to even attempting to keep up with these trends to match their marketing strategies. However, it’s vital that you remember one key aspect; it doesn’t matter what happens to the social media technology, it’s all about how the users of these platforms use and interact with the platforms.
But, trends will always change and will always be evolving. The future holds some very interesting concepts. Take advantage of them now and prepare yourself so you can be one step ahead of the game.
Stay Up-to-Date with Facebook
Let’s face it; Facebook is the superior power when it comes to social media. In fact, it’s the superpower when it comes to the entire internet. No matter what website, app, platform or aspect of technology you use, they’ll always be some form of Facebook interaction.
Facebook’s other platforms, Instagram and Whatsapp are closely following behind and closing the gaps and will very soon be the top three platforms that everybody uses. Facebook already has over 2.3 billion active accounts, and with only 7 billion people on the planet, it’s safe to say that’s pretty much everybody we know.
This means that Facebook won’t be going away anytime soon so ensure that your marketing strategies are always aligned with Facebook and Instagram as a priority.
Take Control of Video Content
Nicola Mendelsohn, Facebook’s Vice President, has recently stated that Facebook will ‘probably be all video content’ in around five years. When you look at your social media feeds today, it’s slowly becoming dominated by video content, either from businesses or individual’s home videos that have gone viral.
Additionally, as a marketer, you’ll need to consider the importance of live video. Platforms such as Instagram and especially Snapchat have made live streams such a normal part of society, and some of the biggest videos in the world with the highest view counts have all been live broadcasts. Ensure you remember this aspect when it comes to your marketing campaign.
Utilise Paid Promotions
We all know that the internet is overloaded with content as it is. To stand out in this vast landscape, it’s important to realise that paid promotions will need to be utilised when needed to boost your outreach, your engagements rates and your brand’s visibility. Already, paid promotion is available in certain packages depending on your preferred social media platform.
However, it’s almost guaranteed that these packages will become more streamlined, more personalised and more customisable over time so, as a marketer, you’ll need to be aware of these changing trends as they happen so you can stay one step ahead of your competition.
Understanding Dark Social
84% of the entire internet’s share volume occurs in the realm known as dark social. This is the term used to describe shared content that happens through private channels, such as instant messaging services or email.
Although this is entirely monitorable as a business, the more people that use social media, the higher this rate of ‘dark’ sharing will occur, so it’s important for your business to understand how this trend will affect your business’ engagement rates.
In the future, you can be sure that social media platforms will make dark social information far more accessible to business users so they can track these statistics as viable sources of traffic. You need to be sure your business is ready to handle this information and how to customise your strategy to suit.
Implementing Emotional Marketing
As we can already see from platforms, predominantly Instagram, inspiration and motivation is becoming a leading form of marketing. Motivational quotes are obviously leading the way, but it’s suggested that this form of marketing will only expand and become more refined over the coming months and years. It could even be described as becoming fashionable.
Currently, a cliché of a motivational post consists of a quote covering an image of a beautiful vista or destination but, with the other considerations of this list in mind, why not adapt video content to become inspirational, much like the Go Pro company already does with their marketing campaign.
This social trend is going to boom and peak very soon, which is why it’s important for your business to be prepared, with the aims of getting ahead of the competition.
Invest in Your Customer Experience
This has always been an important aspect of business, since the very creation of business itself, however, as the world becomes ever more connected, customer feedback, digital word of mouth and reviews will define the success of your business.
If you provide your customers will a negative experience, you can be sure that their followers, friends and family will know about it. Now, more importantly than ever, optimise your customer’s experiences so it’s the best it can be.