How many times have you come across the phrase “social media trends“? bet you heard it a few times at least among friends.
But do you know how important this is? What power does this phrase posses?
Social Media Transformation.
According to the Merriam Webster dictionary, These are some of the definitions of the word “trend“: “A general movement“. “A current style or preference“.
Noticing anything here?
Of course, you are probably wondering what do I want with this? How can you make use of the information given? And your answer is right here in these lines.
But first, let me start by making it clear that social media channels have changed.
It’s no longer for watching videos and profile pictures or catching up with family and old friends and documenting memories.
Social media channels nowadays are becoming an enormous open market, where you have your consumers present at all times.
This means you always need to be updated on social media trends, on what is happening in the virtual world.
And you must take good care of what attracts the public because it’s all about them now.
Best 5 social media trends:
Without further ado, here are some of the most significant social media trends in 2019 you should follow if you want your business to be trendy and thrive.
Live streaming
If you went back in time and told yourself that in the future there is going to be something that could make your family and friends in the east be right there with you when you are blowing your birthday candles in the west you’d have definitely got called crazy.
But if you take a look at the following statistics you’ll see how far we’ve become :
- 63% of people aged 18-34 watch live streaming content regularly.
- 47% of live streaming video viewers worldwide are streaming more live video compared with a year ago.
Just take a look around you, you can find some girl broadcasting live with friends because they went to try a new sushi place, or even stream live when they are driving and singing just for fun.
So if you want to compete on a high level and have yourself ranked on top then you have to start live streaming.
Everyone is going live nowadays even with small life events or personal situations.
Therefore it’s very obvious that everybody will run to watch you broadcast live.
Because everybody is going live on different Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and Tumblr.
People like to share.
They like to feel that others are there with them, that they have a community even if it’s the few facebook friends they have got.
This right here is a big indicator that live broadcasting is the future.
Take advantage of that to promote your product or business or even use it to just let people know who you are.
This feature is taking the spotlight more and more each day.
And if you are smart enough you won’t take it for granted.
You’ll make it an essential part of your marketing plan to engage your audience by going live.
Stories
This trend started with Snapchat at first then moved over to facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp as status.
It is truly strange how this works, you see a small video recording that takes about 20 seconds and stays only for 24 hours still goes a long way with people.
It’ll have lots and lots of views, likes, and comments.
Almost every little detail in people’s life they like to post it as a story, even their breakfast or tea time photos and in return, they watch every other story that’s in front of them.
“The last metric for Facebook Stories was a 300 million daily user milestone back in September. (Instagram Stories hit 500 million daily users in January, so it’s likely more now, though the company isn’t saying quite yet.)”
This is huge, a whole new jump in the digital marketing world.
In my opinion, the trick about social media stories and what makes it this popular is that it gives a sense of mystery.
It shows only a small part, seconds, and the rest you’ll have to dig deeper to look for.
It brings out the part that attracts you the most.
The CEO of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg made a very important statement last year, he declared
“We expect Stories are on track to overtake posts in Feed as the most common way that people share across all social apps.”
Do you know what does this means ?! Making a story will be the first thing people will use on social apps.
I think you don’t need any more signs to realize the gift you have in your hands.
So if you are a good marketer you will use stories in highlighting your every product or service.
You’ll use it to let people know you’re here making sure that your audience will come to you looking for the rest of the story.
#Hashtags
Hashtags are probably the closest trend to my heart. I honestly admire the mind who created it, and it’s brilliance comes from its simplicity.
The first time the hashtag trend started it was in 2007 and by the year 2014, Oxford English Dictionary has decided to make an entry for the word “hashtag“.
“hashtag n. (on social media web sites and applications) a word or phrase preceded by a hash and used to identify messages relating to a specific topic; (also) the hash symbol itself, when used in this way.”
Accordingly, as you can mark, the effect of social media on real-life is growing by the minute and it’s making important changes.
Meanwhile, people are also becoming more practical.
They want to save time and effort as much as they can.
However, they also need to know that they are heard, that their feedbacks are taking into consideration, and to have their questions answered.
You can give your audience all of there requests delivered through one simple character “#”.
This easy yet amazing trend has managed to combine all of the above needs in one thing, hashtags.
And it’s growing to be a crucial way of connecting several social media platforms or accounts in one place.
Maybe that’s why you see a hashtag on almost every post now.
People think that it’s one of the best methods to search for certain information, to read reviews about a product or anything else they want to know more about.
Hashtags also hand you an easy yet effective way to observe the market, your customers, your competitions and what’s new all in one hashtag.
Reinforcing the importance of hashtags Jacquelyn Jacobsma says in an article she wrote early this year:
“with the recent changes in Facebook and Instagram’s algorithms, it’s estimated that 70% of your company’s organic social media content is going unseen. Hashtags can help your content get discovered. In 2019, a good hashtag can drive an entire digital marketing campaign.”
Can you see this “an entire digital marketing campaign”, now try to imagine how powerful this tool is, it’s like you are given the future of marketing on a silver platter.
You got to make sure you’ll use it wisely and not let it go to waste.
Influencer marketing
“Over the last five years, brands have collaborated with social media influencers across channels to generate awareness, and influencer marketing grew from an ancillary marketing tactic to a 5-10 billion dollar industry.” Rochelle Bailis
In simple words, an influencer is someone who has a good number of followers on social media and his speech is heard but still, he didn’t reach the level acquired to be a celebrity yet.
Normal humans who have a message they want to deliver to the world, and they worked hard enough till their voice was hard, even better till they were followed.
At a certain point in time, we had celebrities covering up almost every commercial, some times for different rival companies.
This somehow took some credibility out of advertisements.
But when you use influencers, especially well-trusted ones, you bring back honesty to your product or service.
Influencers are ordinary people just like us, and when they attempt to give some brand awareness people tend to listen, believe and rely on their opinions.
Another way to look at it, influencers will charge you less money than celebrities so it’s a win-win.
The rise of influencers marketing agencies:
And because of this trend, influencers marketing agencies have risen to the surface and became an industry.
Having an influencer as a mean of marketing is not some random act, this is something very organized due to its importance.
You’ll also find that sometimes facebook influencers are different from the ones on Twitter and Instagram.
So if you think for a second to undermine this industry, you’re making a huge mistake.
This is a new way of marketing that’s going very popular extremely fast.
You might as well start thinking of an influencer or two for your next campaign.
Messaging apps and chatbots
Messaging apps
When it comes to messaging, you can’t help but notice that it’s taking a very high curve when used for the market and business.
You can also see that messaging apps are having updates on a regular basis to catch up with the changes in the market and the always new social media trends.
“by 2019, requests for customer support through messaging apps will exceed requests for customer support through traditional social media.
The world of social media is admitting that it’s easier for people to contact stores through messaging apps than to make a phone call.
They find it more comfortable for them to ask and get to know what you are offering for them through texting.
Plus having a connection with customers through messaging apps gives them a sense of privacy and distinctive care, that they are somehow being personally heard.
Chatbots
On other related news, there are chatbots.
You might’ve wondered about them since the beginning when I started mentioning messaging apps.
Of course, I’m not going to forget something as important as chatbots.
Allow me to tell you why all the fuss is about, according to Wikipedia “a chatbot is a type of bot that conducts a conversation via auditory or textual methods“.
The world of artificial intelligence is working pretty well as you can see.
And chatbots are going to be a big hit in the very near future.
Because it’s not only easier and beneficial to customers but it takes a big load of off business entities as well.
Chatbots can save for businesses a lot of time, energy, working hands and of course plenty of money.
So from another point of view chatbots are even way more valuable to you as a marketer or a business owner than it is to the public.
The Conclusion
Right at this moment, you have 5 of the most highly popular trends on social media.
From live streaming to influencers and chatbots, but this is not the end of it, not by a long shot.
It’s pretty clear that the digital world is not stopping for anyone and it’s on you to keep up with it.
There are always going to be many trends, updates, tools and a bunch of different changes.
But you have to fully understand that they will be no good to you unless you act on it.
So from now on make all of your focus on how to be always updated and to use every little new change in digital marketing for the sake of your business.
You also have to be very aware of people’s needs and know what people have a taste of, what they are following or watching, and what they are agreeing on.
And lastly, I advise you when it comes to marketing always go with the flow and direct your ship towards where people stand.
Study, learn and go into the bottom of every new update in the technology world.
Then and only then my friend you’ll have the social media marketing world at your disposal.
That was super helpful!
Really !! thanks a million 🙂 🙂