Social media is rapidly gaining popularity and changing the landscape of communication, collaboration, and personal interaction. Internet forums, message boards, weblogs, wikis and many more are all manifestation of social media. The significant value that social media brings is the chance everyone who posts even in a simple blog to reach billions of users on the Web; in contrast to traditional media like newspapers, TV and Radio, where big media corporations control the creation and distribution of information.
The influence of consumer-powered media is now spreading from smaller bloggers to global corporations and each of them is striving to find proven ways to stand out in the already oversaturated social media.
When we talk about social media we actually mean content and users’ vote for it. Therefore, the question which arises now is what kind of content should be produced? Will quality become less or more important? Will editors start to focus on stories that will gain more votes? What will be preferable by voters? Getting ranked highly today seems to demand a combination of grasping attention, and then providing meaningful points. The new recipe for gaining visibility includes creating information that is both beneficial and exciting. In this connection the headline may become king over content.
Recently video and podcast have been increasingly replacing the text content. Most of video consumption on the Web is already based on social media. It seems much easier to attain visibility and instant attention by video than by textual content. In fact, even a poor video can hold attention if it’s for example funny, but bad blog posts can’t. So the video shouldn’t be overlooked as it is a necessary attribute for success in the social media.
The role of the brands in the social media is another key factor. Most probably the perception of a good and bad brand also drives the user’s voting will. In addition, social media creates its own brands that rapidly gather popularity and become influential. So the concept for branding matters.
Big companies have begun to exploit blogs as innovative way to bring readers and customers back by providing valuable content and insights. They are trying to prevail over entrepreneur bloggers who have already managed to consolidate their efforts in building strong presence and influence over the social media. As more and more time and world-wide attention is given to social media, who really owns the discussions online will set the rules and determine what is important.
Social media will be the predominant media model in the future, so understanding of its principles, following the rules, and keeping an eye on its evolution will turn out to be essential for the achievement of individuals’ and global companies’ visibility.
