Social Media Marketing Trends for 2019

  3 min read It’s that time of the year again. Q2 is already here. Marketers are again searching the internet for what they should be paying attention to. Of course, as a marketer, you want to go where the people are. And, for this undoubtedly you need to be online. The influence of social media is growing.

In 2019, it is estimated that there will be around 2.77 billion social network users around the globe.

Social media is constantly changing, bringing new trends, concepts, and ideas every year. Hence, it’s crucial to keep up with the latest trends to make sure that your strategy is still successful. Also, it is important for marketers to stay ahead and keep themselves engaged in the latest social marketing trends. Now, the question is, “What will be the top social media trends of 2019?” Here are the few trends to follow for another successful year of social media marketing for your business.

Social Media Marketing Trends

#1 Video Content

From our mobile phones to laptops, video content has taken over our screens.

In fact, 80% of what we consume online will soon be video content.

Videos have always been popular on YouTube, but the trend has now taken over Facebook and Instagram. Instagram even launched Instagram TV (IGTV) in June 2018. IGTV is a video application that allows users to upload videos up to 10 minutes in length or up to 60 minutes if you are verified or popular.

Though people are consuming more videos, only 60% of marketers are using video in their marketing strategy.

Moreover, as video content consumption continues to grow, you may be wondering how you can use video in your marketing strategy. Here are a few ideas to help you get started:

• Introduce yourself
• Share customer testimonials and product reviews
• Promos and deals
• Product videos
• Tutorials
• Events and Announcements
• Brand videos
• Company culture videos
• Explainer videos
• Personalized videos

To know more in details about these types of videos, make sure you click here.

#2 Messaging Apps and Chatbots

Companies are providing various channels for users to reach out to them. The popularity of messaging apps such as Facebook Messenger (1.3 Billion active users), WhatsApp and WhatsApp for Business (1 Billion daily active users and 55 Billion messages sent per day), has made it easier to connect to the customer. Also, chatbots are becoming a marketer’s preferred tool to have one-to-one personalized discussions with their consumers. Messaging apps and chatbots will continue to develop and maintain their run on the list of social media marketing trends. Here’s why:

• They offer personalized communications
• They have an easy-to-use interface and are convenient
• Messengers and chatbots provide prompt customer service, thereby enhancing the customer experience.
• Chatbots can be programmed to help and answer basic customer queries

#3 Its Time to Go Live

Live video is on the rise. While live video has been around for a while, it’s prevalence on Facebook and, now, on Instagram has made it a great opportunity for marketers in 2019. Going live is an excellent way to develop trust and loyalty as it is a trustworthy way to interact with your audience. Furthermore, live streams are appealing. Also, they have a huge potential to reach for your business and can increase conversions. If you don’t know where to begin, think about what your audience would love to watch. The opportunities for live videos are infinite, you just have to take the jump to begin! Here’s how to improve marketing through the use of video.

#4 Personalization

Given the huge amount of information being uploaded by people regularly, it’s become very simple to get insights about the people sitting behind the screen. This has opened the door for enhanced personalization, and that, in turn, has raised consumer expectation for the same. Content, products, emails, notifications all can now be based on the consumer’s buying history, clicked links, social media posts, and other behavior. In personalized marketing, customers may worry about vague privacy risks, but they still appreciate the suggested product they’ve been looking for, as well as the notification of the sale in their favorite store. Despite the concerns, personalization is definitely the way to go for marketers to boost campaign performance.

#5 Influencers

In the past few years, social media influencers have become a significant trend. Today, we have innumerable Instagram stars, Twitter influencers, YouTube millionaires. These people have millions of followers. Their every post, vlog, or tweet is immediately seen by huge numbers. When a brand utilizes an influencer marketing strategy, they concentrate on an important person rather than targeting a particular audience. The theory behind influencer marketing is that when an influencer with large following promotes your product, it has a bigger impact than you yourself promoting your product. This is because many people trust the opinions of others more than marketing posts from a brand themselves. But macro-influencers can be costly for small businesses. In such cases, micro-influencers can prove effective. And, they are going to be a huge trend in 2019. Here’s why micro-influencers leverage better than macro-influencers. Micro-influencers have fans less than 10,000 people, but most of their audiences are genuinely interested in what they have to say. These influencers are not massively targeted by advertisers, hence they are trustworthy and down-to-earth. Here’s a list of influencer marketing statistics that you must know.

Wrap Up

All the above mentioned social media marketing trends have one thing in common, they concentrate on enhancing the customer experience. These new tools and opportunities will improve the consumer process, and provide new ideas to connect and convert in real-time. Overall, 2019 is going to be a year of extremely personalized and attractive content. It’s time to treat your customers like close relatives and friends and not just ‘money-providers’. In the comment section below, let us know your favorite social media marketing trick.