Social media is changing. Not so long ago, MySpace and Bebo were the undisputed kings of the social networking world, but where are they now? Today, Twitter and Facebook have assumed dominance at the top of the social media hierarchy, but they’ve also learned from the mistakes of the past. Whereas previous iterations of social media captured brief zeitgeists and then fizzled out as tastes and trends changed, our modern social networks respond to changing audience trends in order to provide a consistently popular level of service. But how does the changing face of social media affect your brand and its content marketing efforts? Take a look at just some of the recent changes to have come into effect and how you ought to respond to them.
If you’re looking at social media purely as a marketing tool, then Twitter is the king of the current platforms. Honed and refined over time, Twitter’s take on social media provides businesses with ample opportunity to share interesting updates, promote products and services and engage with their customers, but even Twitter has changed recently. A new update to the site’s user interface has made the profile page and info feed closely resemble the familiar Facebook layout, with some key differences. Tweets with high engagement now appear in larger text, helping to attract even more viewers, while picture editing and tagging tools and video playback functionality provide a bias towards multimedia content. On the one hand you could argue that the most popular social media platforms are becoming increasingly homogenised, but really all the top platforms are doing is responding to audience trends. Does your content marketing strategy need adjusting to conform to the latest social media trends?
Facebook updates tend to come thick and fast. While the majority of recent changes have been cosmetic – a change in the layout of the news feed here, a tweak in the typeface there – others will have had more of a significant impact on your social media marketing strategy. While Twitter may have followed Facebook’s lead in terms of look and layout, Facebook has followed Twitter in other key areas. Facebook hashtags and trending topics were introduced recently, giving marketers more opportunity to engage with real-time events. An autoplay video function was also included, so your multimedia posts are more likely to be picked up than ever before. Sponsored posts and ads have also been given greater influence, as Facebook looks to monetise the previously free domain of social media marketing. Could a clever content marketing strategy help you to avoid unnecessary costs?
Instagram & Vine
Multimedia sharing apps Instagram and Vine are somewhere between social networks and standalone apps, but still have a significant role to play in the world of content marketing. These two apps have exerted a significant influence on the other most popular social media platforms, with multimedia content now de rigueur amongst the top networks. Following on from the popularity of Vine short video clips can now be shared via Instagram, and it didn’t take Facebook, Twitter and Google+ long to start pushing video content themselves. Savvy businesses can use video content to their advantage.
Google+
Google+ is something of a conundrum in social media circles. Despite the statistics (and the numbers are indeed arresting), public audiences remain largely resistant to the charms of Google+, at least in comparison to the eternally popular Facebook and Twitter. However, Google’s tireless efforts to promote the platform mean that it is arguably the most important for your content marketing strategy. Google has now made it mandatory for every Gmail user to have an associated Google+ account, helping to push monthly active users through the roof. Google’s algorithm also prioritises Google+ engagement, so a popular G+ post is excellent currency when it comes to pushing your name up the search rankings.
Social media changes constantly, and it can be a challenge to keep up with progress and adjust your content accordingly. That’s where we come in. We keep abreast of the latest social media developments and audience trends, changing our approach to content marketing in order to achieve the most beneficial content marketing success. Why not contact the team today and learn more about how we can help?