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Social media trends are always evolving. It is essential to keep up with these changes as they can make a big difference in marketing strategies and how businesses target an audience. Here are a few new trends that could change your marketing strategy for the year.
Instagram is Growing Rapidly
Instagram is the fastest growing website in world. In one year, the number of active users has doubled to 180 million users. This rapid growth is due to sharing photos and visual content with others becoming more and more important. Images can be modified with filters and other settings, making them more interesting to share.
Businesses can leverage Instagram to their advantage and create connections with other users by interacting with fans (by featuring their photos or mentioning them) through Facebook. Companies can also ask lifestyle questions, such as what customers would use a product for or how it fits into their life.
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Using Instagram video can give customers insight into what goes into the brand and encompasses the culture of the business. For example, Burberry has posted videos capturing short scenes from one of their shows, making customers feel as if they were at the show.
Showing the audience behind the scenes videos make them feel involved in the process and can establish real connections. Partnering with similar companies may also be beneficial to both parties and can expose a brand’s product to more users.
Young people still use Facebook
Although it may seem as if younger users are drifting away from Facebook, that is not the case. As new platforms have emerged, teens have been using more visual-based platforms alongside their older Facebook accounts, becoming multi-platform users.
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It’s recommended that you expand on Facebook efforts and provide content on multiple social media networks. If a brand’s content is seen on multiple channels, it can make more of an impact.
When posting to Facebook or other social media platforms, draw attention from younger audiences by keeping things relevant. For example, with posts of teens using a product and their opinions. Concentrate on their needs and how they can benefit from your business.
Users Log In with Facebook
Research shows that, for sites with the option to login via a social network account, 51% of users log in with Facebook and, internationally, 63% of mobile users log in with Facebook.
How can this information benefit a company? By offering a social login option, more customers are likely to stay on a website. 92% of users leave a site when having to recover a password but when there is an option to log in with a social media account, 65% of users are likely to come back.
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Once a user has logged on with their Facebook account, businesses can now use information such as likes and interests to provide a better experience for the user. By offering products a user has already shown interest in, the likelihood of them buying something improves. Brands may provide premium content to users who provide their social media profiles in return.
Promote social media logins by offering member-only content, such as a message forum. This can increase interaction as well as more visibility socially. Another way to increase social prominence is to provide new and interesting content whenever users log on. Because they are already logged onto their Facebook accounts, users can share content or comment easily.
Customer Care Through Twitter
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After establishing a customer base, interact with customers through Twitter. When asking questions about a brand or product, research has shown that customers mostly take to Twitter rather than Facebook.
Make sure that your staff quickly answers questions; grievances and other feedback should not be left unanswered for more than one hour. Whether they answer influencers or customers first, prioritizing tweets will need to be established. Another option is to respond in a first-come, first-served process.
When checking mentions, read through the feedback and respond to any problems straightaway. Not all conversations require the company’s input as customers may be simply talking about a product or brand.
By following new research on social media trends, companies can employ new strategies to attract and establish a growing customer base. These new trends can help show users company culture and engage with customers on a broader scale.