Social Media Trends For 2019

Consumers expect brands to fix what is wrong with social media in 2019. According to the 2018 Edelman Trust Barometer Special Report: Brands and Social Media and their research in nine countries with 9000 respondents, trust in social media is at 41% worldwide. To begin repairing trust, companies will have to

Listen more
Brands will continue to monitor social media for reputation management and customer service. However, they will also listen in order to generate leads and sell products directly on social media sites. As a small business, you will want to take advantage of micro-moments, those moments when potential customers are online and ready to take immediate action. We explained this in more detail in our post “What Is A Micro-Moment And How Do I Use It For My Business?”

Communicate in real-time
As mentioned in our post “What A Bot Can Do For Your Business,” customers prefer to message businesses—instead of calling them—to get appointments and information; to secure rebates, refunds, and replacements; to complain and seek compensation; and even to make purchases. This is all due to the increased use of smartphones, messaging apps, AI/artificial intelligence, and chatbots. Social media and blog posts may be perceived as talking “at” your target audience. With the help of messaging apps, you can talk “with” your customers.

Make tough decisions about personalization
According to the Edelman study, more than half (54%) were uneasy about having their purchases tracked and 49% preferred less personalization if it meant keeping their data private. However, personalization can make it easier for a customer to make a repeat purchase or locate a hard-to-find item. Analytics also make selling on social media (social selling) easier for you. You decide how much or how little personalization your customers will appreciate.

Rely on different influencers
Famous people no longer have as much influence over purchasing decisions as family, friends, peers, and satisfied customers. You want to capture their input.

How will you, as a business, make this happen?

Tell a believable story
Digital marketing and content continue to be crucial to trust on social media. Instead of long posts, you will want to use stories on platforms like Instagram and Facebook. These stories can be
• Recorded by you and/or your customers in the moment
• Visual (and, thus, the option for visual searches)
• Quick
• Live
• Highly engaging
• Part of telling how to use a product
• Easily viewed on a mobile phone or tablet

Up your video game
Since we first wrote about video marketing in 2013 with our post “Adoption Of Video Marketing Increases” and again in “Social Media Trends For 2018,”  YouTube is not your only video option. In fact, this year’s trends include both live videos and vertical videos. Live videos increase consumer confidence in your brand as you give how-to tips, tell human interest stories about your people, and let customers talk about their experience with your company and your products or services. Vertical videos are most easily viewed on a smartphone so it makes sense to shoot them in this format as smartphone usage continues to rise.

Tate Design is equipped to help you implement these social media trends. Call us at 610.725.0702 or e-mail [email protected] to get started.

 

References
Edelman’s Trust Barometer Global Report
Facebook IQ’s Why Messaging Businesses Is The New Normal
Hootsuite’s Top 5 Social Media Trends In 2019 (And How Brands Should Adapt)