Social media is any digital marketing tool that enables users to quickly create and share content with the public. It includes a wide range of websites and apps. Some platforms like Twitter, specialize in sharing links and short written messages. Others, like Instagram and TikTok, are built to optimize the sharing of photos and videos.
The year 2020 has been a rollercoaster ride for marketers. The COVID-19 pandemic has changed consumer behavior and industry demands, and brands should be familiar with these changing trends and adjust their content and brand messaging accordingly to fit the modern landscape.
Importance of social media:
In today's digital world, Social Media plays a crucial role in our life, we are using it to keep in touch with our friends and make some new friends. Besides that, we want to show the world what we are doing using posting pictures or videos. A few years ago Social Media wasn’t that big yet, but nowadays people can use it for almost anything in their daily life.
Social media marketing is one of the most significant marketing strategies for ecommerce businesses and it has managed to become an essential part of our lives in a short period. What started as a medium to stay in touch with friends and family, soon become a channel for brands and businesses to connect with their target audience through well-crafted social media strategies.
Several social media trends have emerged and evolved over the years with the rapid growth of this medium. Adapting to these new and upcoming trends is what enables businesses to keep abreast of the fierce competition.
Social Media Trends: 5 Important Things to Watch for in 2021:
Here is a list of social media trends for 2021 that every marketer should follow for better engagement and improved online visibility.
1.The Proliferation of Memes on Social Media
The very first social media trend you need to know about isn’t exactly new but it has been gaining popularity in recent months very quickly. We’re talking about the rise of memes.
Memes usage and mentions increased from 19.8 million in August 2019 to 24.9 million in July 2020, marking a 26 percent rise in just a single year.
With the pandemic and resulting lockdowns expected to continue into 2021, it’s more than likely that memes will continue to trend on social media. As a business owner, this is certainly something to consider including in your social media strategy—if you haven’t already done so.
- Start Profiting From Your Social Media Videos
During the lockdown, videos have become even more popular and many social media platforms are now offering more video features for businesses. Video streaming is one that has seen demand surge. With a huge market value of $42.9 billion in 2019, the industry is expected to grow 20.4 percent between 2020 and 2027.
Popular social media platforms like Instagram is also increasing its video capabilities as views of its live videos jumped 70 percent from February to March 2020. To encourage video creation, it now enables ads to be shown before long-form videos on its IGTV (Instagram TV) service, with 55 percent of those revenues going to creators.
- Social Media Stories Are Not Going Anywhere
Be it Facebook, WhatsApp, or Instagram stories, If you’re considering marketing on stories, you’ll want to pay attention to this next social media marketing trend. For all three platforms mentioned above, the stories feature enables users to post a limited-time update that disappears after 24 hours.
These features were all launched less than five years ago, it’s proven to be one of the more popular growing social media trends among users and their growth numbers certainly indicate that they’re here to stay.
- Growth in Messaging Apps
Messaging apps are one of the latest trends in social media marketing. Presently, 90 percent of all smartphone users around the globe use at least one messaging app, which is a huge market for businesses to tap into. Coupled with the fact that most consumers prefer to communicate with companies is via messaging, this is certainly a social media trend you should include in your business’ marketing plan.
WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger may be the two most popular mobile messenger apps with 1.6 million and 1.3 billion monthly active users respectively. But if you’re targeting markets such as China, WeChat, which has 1.1 billion monthly active users, would be the way to go.
- Customer Service via Social Media
One of the latest social media trends relates to customers increasing use of social media for customer service issues. A recent study shows that approximately three in ten customers use social media to communicate with a company.
Social media has become an important channel of contact for customers and even has an impact on branding. Approximately 70 percent of US residents say that being able to directly message a company makes them feel more confident about the brand.
Conclusion:
These are some of the trends that will dominate the social media landscape in 2021 and beyond and will have a huge impact on the users, as well as, brands. If you haven’t adapted to these new trends, it’s time you do so to leverage your brand on social media and stay ahead of the competition.