Fashion trends have come and gone almost since the dawn of time. In modern times though trends are everywhere. Food is often trend driven. Goji berries and smashed avocado on toast anyone?
Now, in an increasingly connected world, there’s no ignoring social media trends.
The reason? Our inter-connectedness across a multitude of platforms.
Every brand, from one-man bands to global corporations, is publishing online content. But it’s not limited to businesses. Every social media consumer is a creator too. What with Facebook live, Periscope, Twitter and Snapchat there’s a myriad of ways for you to connect with your customers.
Being wise owls we’ve taken a look at Hootsuite’s guide to 2017’s social media trends. Out of that we’ve put together the Visually Explained guide to what’s hot-to-trot in the social media world.
- Social is rivalling the use of search engines for discovery and research: they’re still top-dog when it comes to consumers checking out and weighing products up before they buy. But the young pup social is snapping at the search engines’ heels. This is notable in particular among younger buyers. Global Web Index found that a staggering 36% of 16-24s make social media their go-to place to investigate products and brands.
- Social commerce is up-and-coming: We know. You’ve heard the hype before. But this time it’s different. Widespread adoption in APAC (Asia-Pacific region) combined with new features put in place by Pinterest and Instagram make this evolution inevitable. This blog explains why APAC businesses are riding high on the social commerce wave.
- Video set social advertising on fire: Moving on from the domination of social video we have the combination of the emotional power associated with social media and the sheer scale and stretch of social advertising, As this May 2016 study from Animoto found, 70% of marketers intend to use social video advertising in the coming year. And the platform of choice will be Facebook.
Evolution and a social media revolution
Having got an overview of social trends for 2017 let’s take a quick look at how social networks look set to evolve in 2017.
Twitter: Twitter’s will focus its efforts on real-time moments. Businesses will carry on using Twitter to create shareable customer experience moments so they can increase loyalty and serve their customers on social. And make it snappy.
Facebook: The top network for driving conversions from social, Facebook will hold pole-position. But this service won’t be free. You’ll need to pay to play on this platform. You can expect to see more advertising opportunities along with a continued push for social commerce.
Instagram: Inspiration and brand awareness is the name of the game here. Use it to inspire your customer and help them discover new products and services.
Snapchat: This image messaging and multimedia mobile application is now maturing as a social marketing channel. It has a greater focus on content than other networks. Some BIG brands have seen success at using Snapchat to distribute content.
LinkedIn: Is a business- and employment-oriented social networking service. Microsoft acquired LinkedIn in 2016. A good reason to expect it to carry on investing as it aims to become the go-to platform for professionals who want to stay ahead on what’s happening in their industry and their network.
Training
In the light of all this it’s not hard to see why businesses need to care about social media training: for themselves and their employees.
If nothing else, any company and social media manager will want staff to act in a professional manner when using social media. One that is consistent with the brand and its policies.
It doesn’t end there though. As this Hootsuite blog explains, many companies are taking things to the next level. They’re supporting their sales teams to use social media platforms like LinkedIn to network and build relationships and to share company content through their networks.
Going to the Dark Side
One thing we’ve not mentioned in all of this is the rise of Dark Social. Fuelled by mobiles and messaging, dark social is fast gaining ground.
If you’re in the dark about what it is and what it means to you and your business look out for next month’s blog post where we’ll be shining a torch into its darkest recesses..
