What are the Social Media Trends for 2012?
As we approach the end of the year, there is no better time to pause and take a look at what the future holds for one of the most buzzing communications and marketing tools we have: social media. 2012 looks to be the year when social media will move past being a ‘buzzword’, with marketers kicking it up a notch to build even greater communities – ones that are even more engaged. With this social media trend in mind, social media will be more closely integrated with business strategy, rather than an “on-whim” tactic. So, if you haven’t established a social media presence for your company yet, then you will need to do ASAP, or you will risk being overcrowded in this space by more strategic competitors.
Social Media Trends | Engagement
Social Media Engagement will become a central performance indicator of company strategy. Brands and companies will have their hardwork set out for them in that they will need to engage users in fresh, new ways to keep them interested. With engagement key, transparency will follow, with more people becoming comfortable sharing more and more information. 2012 will be a year when we see greater buy-in from our social media followers – they will share their opinions more and send more “likes” in favor of being so concerned about protecting their information. This social media trend is great news for companies with a solid social media presence.
Social media specialists also predict that there will be a convergence of social media, online comments and search engine optimization. The current functionality to search for a particular business, location, return links and online reviews, among others, is about to be blown out of the water with reviews highlighted by social media connections.
Social Media Trends | Content
There will be even greater opportunities for EVERYONE to play a part in content creation, with social media networking sites looking to concentrate on developing their consumable short-form content capabilities to create emerging forms of storytelling. For instance, in Twitter marketing we view each tweet as a little message – in the future, it is predicted that there will be more options to bring these tweets together to create powerful and meaningful narratives.
We are already seeing a move towards improved content and information filtering options, with the ability to propagate the most relevant content. Users love this so we can only anticipate that we’ll see more products and services like Klout emerge and they will be taken up by more of a mainstream audience.
On the horizon is the exciting integration of social media and technology. With so many companies dedicating their time to creating innovative options that challenge the way we interact with social media, there are sure to be some fantastic technologies emerging.
And finally, an easy prediction: that more and more information (from news to product reviews and information) will be distributed via social media channels. As more things digitalise, more things will be distributed in this form – even business cards? Maybe.
Image: jscreationzs / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
There are big things ahead so watch this space and keep up to date with the latest social media trends.