5 Social Media Predictions for 2019
Happy belated New Year everyone!
Now we’ve had our first full week back to the work week after the holiday season, it’s time to sit down, get a cup of your favourite caffeine-infused drink and get yourself ready for an amazing year in business.
Now, some of you may have noticed that I have been away from my own Social Media for a little while now – quite ironic for a Social Media Manager isn’t it! However, I have not been away from the Social Media world itself. Instead of focusing on my own content and Social Media, I really wanted to dive into my client work and focus more on them and not on my own content – and see what more I can learn from the different industries. I also wanted to focus more on my mindset – but that’s a story for another post.
This year, my resolution is to give you the best information in an easy to digest format. This includes unique strategies that are working in different industries, trials and tribulations with content (let’s admit, sometimes content is a FLOP!), tips from amazing business owners just like you and so much more. I’m excited.
So alas, I am back, and here to share what I have learnt with everyone.
Anyway, back to the matter at hand. As it’s the whole New Year New Me time, I thought it’d be very fitting to kick it off with what I believe is going to explode your business this year, as well as what might not cut it.
Organic Reach on Facebook will be harder, but more valuable
Most of us are aware by now that Organic Reach is steadily declining on Facebook and ad cost is getting higher, but I think the organic reach we do get must be gained in different ways.
Facebook Groups are going to continue to grow in popularity as more and more niche groups appear for both local and international hobbies/ideas, giving businesses more opportunity to market. However, this being said, if you don’t do it right you’ll be doing it more than twice.
Consumers have “spam alerts” in their brain (or that’s what I like to call them) that are going nineteen to the dozen when sifting through posts on Facebook – if it looks bad they won’t buy. This is more common in British based groups as opposed to American. All content you post into groups must be unique to that group, related, and not posted into 10,000 groups at once. Nobody likes notification spam, and if your Facebook friends are in those groups – they will be spammed.
Tip: Spread out your group posts throughout the day to maximize online reach, and adapt the post to suit the audience of the group. Don’t focus on selling your products, but providing value.
Memes will continue to rise in popularity, but context is key
Memes have taken over the internet ever since I can remember, but the past few years have been crazy. Memes have a place in Social Media Marketing, and they are most definitely here to stay. They’re usually funny/relatable, highly shareable and very engaging to most audiences. Even here on LinkedIn!
However, that doesn’t mean a meme can necessarily be right for your post.
Let me give you an example.
See how the New Zealand police force used a Gif that was extremely insensitive and inappropriate for their brand.
However, Seamless adapted a popular cat-cheeseburger meme and turned it into something that suited their brand.
Dominos created their own graphic taking advantage of the publicity from Netflix’s latest hit film – BirdBox.
And Footlocker used a popular meme format and created their own, relating to people who like to buy a lot of shoes.
Another great brand to check out is Wendy’s. They have their own voice and style that they use in all posts, and use memes that suit that. They don’t go off brand to be cool, they stay within brand and go viral. Think about how you can do this for your company.
Top Tip: Find a meme template and create your own.
Text posts have made a comeback, video will continue to dominate
For the past few years, many marketers (including myself) have been raving about using video in your marketing – but I think some of us have been missing a trick too. Text posts have been making a comeback towards the final quarter of 2018 and I believe this will continue into 2019.
For some of us, text posts are much easier to digest on the go, in the office, whilst laying in bed at 3am scrolling…. Sometimes a video is just an inconvenience.
Storytelling posts and useful list posts will continue to rise in popularity, with many going viral. We are already seeing this trend a lot on LinkedIn and have for a while, stories sell. If you want to jump on this bandwagon, craft a compelling story that leads your consumer on an emotional journey. Make sure it hits them right in the feels.
If you can get your audience to hang off every word while you’re storytelling – they will hang off your words when you sell to them.
Funnels (or buyer journeys) will become more accessible to the smaller businesses
For a while now, funnels have been the buzzword of the marketing world, and for good reason. They aren’t something that has come out more recently, but are an old strategy that’s been revised for the digital age.
A funnel is the journey your customer takes to get from A to B, from your adverts to making a purchase. The idea is to make this process as smooth and streamlined as possible to lower the cost of marketing,increase the conversions and ultimately, make more sales. However, many businesses I speak to (moreso in the UK & Europe) aren’t aware of the funnel strategy and how it can benefit their business.
I’m thinking this will change over the coming months and small businesses, once adopting this strategy, will see a significant increase in the performance of their digital marketing.
3 times is the charm, for content production
Everyone is different, and that includes your audience. Though their interests and behaviours may be similar, we all have slightly different preferences. This comes down to content too. As I mentioned above, video will continue to dominate but text is making a comeback? Well – we also have another type of content that is just aching for your attention… and that is… audio.
Some of your audience may not like consuming text-based content, they may not like videos all that much either because they are on the go. This is where audio comes in. Audio can be consumed at any time – Karen can listen to it whilst she’s driving to work, Steve can listen while he does the dishes.. You get the gist.
But you see – the cool thing is it doesn’t require a whole revisit to your strategy to implement – you can simply repurpose the content you have created in text or video format and transform it into audio. This means you can reach a much wider range of audience members simply by using the audio from a video you have created.
That being said, it won’t work for every video. Use your initiative and ask yourself – does this make sense with no video? Will my audience get value from listening to this? If the answers are both yes – then get audio-ing 😉