I’m going to discuss 10 social media trends for you to capitalize on. And make sure to
stick to the end for some of the best reports that can make a big difference in your business.
All of that and more coming right up.
1. Virtual reality will become more popular on social media
In 2021 and 2022, we’ll likely see virtual reality gaining much more popularity on social
media platforms as these platforms release and integrate this technology.
Facebook is taking a lead in this area with the release of its new Facebook Horizon, which
lets you explore virtual worlds where you can connect with people across the world,
participate in fun challenges, and even create your own virtual worlds. All you need is an
Oculus VR headset to use it.
As of this recording, Horizon is in the invite-only beta phase.
2. Social Media Commerce will continue to grow
Facebook and Instagram make it easier than ever before to let consumers buy products
without ever leaving those platforms.
Facebook Shops lets you set up a shop that people can browse and lets people buy your
products. You can already see brands like ThreadBeast
setting up these types of social media storefronts.
Likewise, Instagram Shoppable posts allows you to add your products to your Instagram
posts and enable easy checkout without ever leaving the platform.
These are perfect tools to increase your sales because 54% of social media users research
products using social media. Not only that, these tools simplify and shorten the customer
journey and reduce abandoned transactions.
3. Social Media Communities are Exploding in Popularity
Social media communities are basically social groups created by brands to provide a networking
platform for their customers. These are usually private groups that like-minded people can
join to talk about their shared interests.
Facebook Groups in particular are more popular than ever with over 1.8 billion people using
them. And there are tens of millions of groups on Facebook.
This is one of the biggest advantages of Facebook Groups. Whenever you post on a regular Facebook
page, only 5.5% of your audience might see that post. If you create a Facebook group,
your post in that group will reach a considerably higher percentage of people in that group.
Brands can also utilize their social media communities like Facebook Groups to announce
new products, seek customer feedback, and gain valuable customer insights.
4. More brands are using live streaming Due to lockdowns in 2020, Facebook and Instagram
saw a massive increase in live streaming and it’s likely here to stay since people are
so used to them.
Some of the most important use cases for live streaming are Q&As, tutorials, making important
announcements, hosting challenges, hosting shopping events, and more.
At the moment, the most popular platforms to stream live events are Facebook, Instagram,
Twitch, Twitter, and of course, YouTube.
5. Video Content Will Dominate Early in 2020, HubSpot's Not Another State
of Marketing Report found that video was the most commonly used marketing content — and
the second most engaging content type on social media.
https://www.hubspot.com/state-of-marketing?_ga=2.134249329.1099203190.1626114852-375867262.1625001036
And according to a Cisco study, by 2022, 82% of all online content will be in the video
format. This clearly shows how important it is to start utilizing video content to stay
relevant on social media.
6. Influencer Marketing Will Continue to Rise Influencers can help marketers reach large
numbers of potential customers. And using influencers is usually cheaper than running
paid ad campaigns.
According to a report by Morning Consult: • 72% of Gen Z and Millennials follow influencers
• Influencers are more trusted as spokespeople than celebrities: 50 percent of Millennials
trust influencers they follow on product recommendations, compared to 38 percent for their favorite
celebrities.
Many companies aren’t just working with 1 or 2 influencers at a time, they’re working
with whole networks of small, relevant, niche influencers. This approach is becoming more
popular because working with niche influencers can have a much higher return on investment
than working with one celebrity for an endorsement deal.
Also, influencers are even more valuable when they actually use those company’s products
on a normal basis and they can provide how-to videos and demonstrations in regards those
products.
7. The Growing Need for Social Media Chatbots Many brands don’t have the ability to provide
24 by 7 support for their customers. With AI-powered chatbots integrated to social media
pages, customers can get answers to their questions at any time of the day.
ManyChat is an example of a chatbot service that connects to Facebook messenger and Instagram.
8. “Local Targeting” Will Become More Prevalent
Local targeting became more popular in 2021 and that will continue in coming years.
Local targeting occurs when local brands geo-tag their social media posts and stories to reach
their target customers.
Instagram already allows people to look for posts and stories that are closest to them,
which allows local brands to be more discoverable. Additionally, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram
promotions enable businesses to target audiences from a specific geographic location through
their IP addresses.
9. Stories are Still Growing in Popularity Peoples’ attention spans are shorter than
ever, and they enjoy short and engaging content in the form of photos and short videos. That
is why Instagram Stories are becoming more and more popular year after year.
According to a recent report by Hootsuite, 64% of marketers either have already incorporated
Instagram Stories into their strategies or they plan to go that route.
10. The Traditional Social Platforms Will Continue to Dominate
Traditional social networks such as Facebook, Instagram, Linkedin, and Twitter still dominate
the social media space, and it could stay that way for a few years.
TikTok experienced decent growth over the last couple of years, but it’s usage is
no where close to the other platforms yet. It only grew from 5% to 9% when it comes to
total usage across all social media platforms over the last year according to this report
from Social Media Examiner.
Reports I highly recommend the following reports on
social media trends: • Social Media Examiner’s Social Media
Marketing Industry report • Hootsuite’s annual Social Trends report
• And Morning Consult’s Influencer Report about Engaging Gen Z and Millennials
You can find links to each report in the video description below.
Thank you so much for watching this video. If you want to find out about the best social
media marketing tools to use for your business, make sure to click the video to the right.