“The years shall run like rabbits poetic words.” With his poetic words, WH Auden underlined how quickly time flies. The last quarter of the year is closing in on us, with 2022 just around the corner! Don’t you just look forward to a new year where you can spend less time firefighting and instead focus more on growing your business? These trends in social media marketing can give you reason enough to get your spirits up and look ahead.
Shopping platforms will increase social media leverage.
Demand for short-form video content will grow stronger.
With the abundance of digital information just a click away, the attention span of the average online consumer is getting shorter by the nanosecond. In the past, people had more focus and patience to listen or read long marketing spiels. That is no longer the case. Today, people want to access and consume information as quickly as possible. Short -form videos can do this.
Tiktok is leading the way in this arena. The video platform and social media app, which allows its users to create and share or watch 15-second videos (or a string of four 15-seconders), is already the world’s most downloaded app. With about one billion users, Tiktok can be a viable marketing strategy.
Before you begin producing several short videos for your next marketing campaign, watch out for a few things. The primarily Gen Z market of these video snippets click on them to be entertained. Business-related messages, therefore, have to be subtle if they are to be effective.
Augmented reality will be more attractive.
Augmented reality or AR is an edited or customized version of the real world. An example is Loreal’s virtual makeup app, where users can try different makeup products before purchasing anything. You can also check out the AR in Ikea’s mobile app that allows customers to experiment with true-to-scale virtual furniture models in their own spaces, so they can pick the best items to go with things they already have. AR can therefore help online shoppers become more confident about their purchases.
The enjoyable experiences enabled by AR also make people look forward to repeating them, which means visitors at your site will keep coming back. With higher customer engagement, there will be more marketing touchpoints for your products or services.
AR can also help you stand out in a highly competitive market. To rise above the din of commercial clatter, you need to have a unique business proposition. With the technologically advanced features of your AR app, you can tap the younger digitally savvy Gen Z market. At the same time, AR can also give your long-standing customers a novel immersive shopping experience that can get them more interested in what you have to offer.
Virtual events will be a viable alternative to in-person gatherings.
Businesses, in general, use a multi-pronged approach to marketing, which may include events such as product launches, trade shows, educational campaigns, even concerts, and parties. These events allow your marketers to interface with prospective customers and build relationships with them.
However, with the pandemic, many brick-and-mortar businesses have transitioned to an online platform. So have many in-person events. Enterprises must adapt to changing conditions, such as what we are experiencing now, to survive and perhaps, even thrive.
Producing virtual events allow us to continue engaging with our customers in ways we never thought possible. Online events erase geographical boundaries, leading to higher event attendance. They can also be scaled with ease at less time and cost, enabling you to have a wider reach. With more people at your event, the more exposure there will be for your marketing message.
User-generated content will be more relevant.
It is not just the micro-influencers who can lay claim to having social media power. The rest of the online community is making sure that their voices are heard, too, through user-generated content. Fellow netizens have become the go-to sources for reviews on a multitude of products and services. These reviews are perceived to have less commercial agenda since they come from members of the social media community who regularly try out such products and services themselves, making their endorsements more credible and authentic.
Businesses can leverage several forms of user-generated content, such as blog posts, social media content, reviews, and testimonials. Because the online conversations here are more organic and flowing, you can gain continuous feedback that can prove to be more insightful than product forums, surveys, and other more traditional means of securing consumer opinion. You can then use this feedback to improve your products and increase your topline numbers.
