August 26, 2020
Social media is an ever-changing landscape that can be hard to keep up with, especially when preparing your social media marketing strategy for your business. New social media trends crop up every few months or so, and you can be sure your customers are keeping up. If you need help staying up to date or you’re just looking for easy-to-use resources for your social media marketing campaigns, then look no further. Here are the top three social media trends to be aware of as we head toward 2021.
1. VIDEO CONTENT
TIKTOK: By now you’ve heard of the China-based video content app and the success it’s had in the last three years since its initial launch. TikTok is unlike any other video-sharing platform: videos are 60 seconds or shorter, there are many editing features available in the app, Gen Z makes up the majority of its users, and its parent company is branching out into the music streaming industry.
Marketers can tap into the unique TikTok market in a variety of ways by creating challenges and other social media trends and using celebrities or other influencers to reach certain audiences. Companies such as Chipotle and Fenty Beauty have been among the most successful to break into this platform.
Activity: Divide students into groups and have each group create a TikTok profile. Each group will decide on a target audience and create a video in an attempt to reach and appeal to that audience. Encourage students to create a specific type of video such as a dance challenge, a cooking video, or something else.
Additional resource: Ultimate TikTok Guide
PERSONALIZED VIDEO MARKETING: Vidyard defines personalized video marketing as, “video that has been customized to each individual viewer. This is achieved by inserting personal elements such as the viewer’s name, email, job title, profile image, company name, logo, etc. directly into the video.” This is easily achieved — there’s no need to make individual videos for each recipient. Instead, use a video personalization platform (such as https://www.idomoo.com/ and https://www.hippovideo.io/video-personalization.html), which will allow you to repurpose the same video.
Repurposing video for different audiences or different individuals will allow your company to leverage personalized videos and garner higher email open rates and higher click-through rates. It will increase engagement and build a relationship with customers. It’s becoming harder and harder to break through the noise of social media and social media trends, but this is one easy way to make direct contact with potential and current customers.
2. INSTAGRAM CHANGES
HIDING LIKES: There have been theories swirling for years surrounding post engagement, influencers, and archived posts. “Facebook’s growth and data science teams developed a hypothesis that getting rid of likes would make users feel less self-conscious when their posts don’t receive much engagement, spurring them to post more,” according to Salvador Rodriguez of CNBC in 2019. Therefore, less pressure = more posting.
Social media Instagram screenshot of influencer Aspyn Ovard wearing a long yellow dress holding her baby in front of a bush. Aspyn is looking at her baby with a smile and the baby has an arm raised. The caption of the photo says “Someone did not enjoy Father’s Day pics!! So grateful for this baby girl and her daddy.” The photo has been liked by cozyearthbedding and others.
Instagram is slowly beta testing this hypothesis, but remaining cautious since hidden likes may cause more harm than good to influencers’ profiles. This is because influencers and other Instagram celebrities benefit from “like momentum” referring to other users liking a post simply because they saw another friend already liked that post. Instagram remains confident it will retain its influencer users because they have few other platforms to retreat to, despite influencers becoming such a movement in social media trends in recent years.
GROWING POPULARITY OF STORIES: As of the end of 2019, 500 million people used Instagram stories every day, and that number rises every year. Marketers can utilize Instagram Stories by posting daily on their company’s profile to keep the company top of mind for its users or customers. Marketers can also use Stories to launch ad campaigns and save those stories to be featured on their company’s profile.
3. NICHE MARKETING
MICROTARGETING: How does your social media course define social media? According to Joei Chan of Social Media TodaySocial, media provides a way to connect with “bundles of audiences defined by specific interests.” This is achieved through microtargeting, which segments wide audiences into smaller groups by gathering demographic, behavioral, geographic, and psychological data on consumers. By segmenting customers into smaller groups, marketers can more effectively target those groups and create advertisements based on each group’s interests.
According to Social Media Today, “media diversification means there’s now content available for pretty much any niche group of fans. This makes it crucial for brands to understand online dynamics when promoting their products, as the messaging and context for one ad campaign may not work for another.”
MICRO-INFLUENCERS: With fewer followers than other influencers — usually between 10–100k — micro-influencers attract more loyal followers. In fact, “they have better engagement rates, they’re smaller, target a niche-specific audience, and because their audience trusts their opinions – have higher conversion rates.” via MediaRails. Creating authentic content and nurturing trust makes micro-influencers the masters of word-of-mouth (WOM) marketing. They are also much cheaper than other celebrities like Kylie Jenner or Chris Hemsworth with their millions of followers.
Looking for additional engaging marketing ideas for social media? Contact Louis Mamo & Company for all of your traditional and digital marketing needs.
(Sources: Stukent, Marketing Article Library and Proven SEO)