Social media plays a key role in all sorts of communication and interaction with the world. Being an active participant of the social media platform allows us to discover the world and helps us keep up to date with the trends going on.

Businesses are surrounded by many new marketing strategies and if you’re not a part of it then you’re definitely missing out.

Social media optimizationis constantly changing, bringing new ideas, trends and unspoken rules in the business front. These trends, however, are not sudden or surprising but gradual over time.

It is therefore important to make use of social media to the fullest else it to hasten maximum benefits os digital media. For instance, the shutting down of Googe+ is an example of a major game changer in the social media sphere.

Here are some expected social media trends that are going to grow and get better in the coming year 2019.

Focus on the next generation population

The next generation or the Gen Next is another name for the millennials or the millennial generation. As the millennials or next Gen is surrounded by social media in abundance, it is the best audience.

Marketers are starting to target the new generation as it is always up to date with the newest trends in the social media sphere. Not just advertising, businesses are using tactics like meet and greets and hosting events with the help of the reach of social media.

Use of messenger apps and chatbots

Other than voice and video calls, chats are the next most widely used platform for any type of socially interactive activity. They can be used to connect to the users with or without accessing their contact details. Many businesses like customer care services and other types of service providers often use this medium to reach out to the consumers.

Timeliness of reply and feedback

Consumers require the services offered to them almost instantly as they have a limited attention span. It is similar to instant messaging and chat bots in some way, being available almost all the time. The key feature of the social media trend is 24×7 availability, customer support, real-time responses and constant monitoring.

Effective video content

Humans are visual learner by nature and hence they adapt and pay their attention to visual media faster than any other medium. Platforms like Snapchat and Instagram make use of similar features such as stories to allow users to share and search video content. Businesses are realising the potential and versatility of videos and by using such platforms marketers reach out to their potential customers.

Live streaming

Live streaming is another level of interaction with social media users. Rather than working on a finished product and waiting for it to develop, marketing managers are adopting live streaming. It helps in gaining potential customers and also giving them an insight into the more intimate and behind the scenes settings of their brand and products. People active on social media like to keep up to date with all that is going on and also a litte in depth.

Include influencers in your marketing strategy

In the past few years, social media influencers marketing has become a major trend. Influencers have many followers and supporters who believe in most of the things they say or promote. Youtube personalities, Instagram stars, snapchat personalities are some of the examples of influencer marketers in social media.

Businesses sponsor their videos or content and in return, the influencer marketers promote their brand. The masses that follow these influencers invest their trust in them and boost the business of the sponsors.

Social listening

Apart from actively participating and emphasising heavily on branding and advertising, an efficient Social Media Optimization strategy includes Social listening (monitoring). It is the act of crawling the web space to search for any mentions or keywords of the brand. This includes untagged mentions of the brand name or similar products on different platforms like blogs, videos, news sites etc. The primary goal of social listening currently is to provide effective customer service, reputation management among many others.

Social media trends in the year 2018 were centred at personalization and creating a sense of control over what, when, where and how a consumer sees. Businesses are now focussing on playing the role of a navigator. Prospected consumers can be approached, connected and be gathered for feedback all through these latest trends in social media in the following year.