The Social Media Trends for 2018 – Anticipating a Highly Happening Year for the Industry!

0
1974
Social media trends 2018

2018 is going to be a much happening year for social media. Professionals and industry experts are expecting to see abrupt trends and upheavals in the industry. Well, the time is ripe and with all the money pouring from everywhere, you can expect some big changes coming as the year unfolds.

We have compiled some highly anticipated social media trends for 2018. This surely looks like a year of happenings and change.

  1. The Algorithm Fight

Over the years social media have been evolving their algorithms much to the dismay of many businesses. The latest algorithm update from Facebook in 2017, hurt the organic searches for many brands. This is among the stings of changes that have been unveiled by Facebook and other social media platforms over the years. Similar algorithm updates have been integrated by Twitter as well as Instagram.

Businesses have traditionally relied on second-tier tactics like encouraging their followers to like, share or tag other people in their Facebook posts. However, recently the authorities at Facebook have decided to come hard on businesses implying these tactics. This has already hurt businesses running their pages on Facebook; a significant decrease in the number of organic searches. We are expecting to see such algorithms being integrated by other social media platforms as well.

Related Read: 6 Must Watch Out Website Design Trends in 2018!

  1. Money all the Way

Social media platforms have become money making machines. This is yet another trend that has been gradually progressing over the years and it will certainly continue to grow in 2018. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or any other social media platforms now demands money from businesses to connect them with the intended audience.

For instance, for a website design company looking to connect with potential customers, it can no longer rely on organic processes like tagging, sharing or liking, rather it will have to pay the platform just to be able to connect with the right audience. This means that we’ll be seeing a significant rise in social media ad spending from businesses looking to boost their sales over the social media platforms. Many businesses have already formed a dedicated team to manage social media finance and control and you can surely expect to see more businesses taking this route.

However, with the money being spent overwhelmingly on social media ads, businesses are likely to press

these platforms to tighten their ships, especially with respect to the target audience and advertising services.

  1. Virtual Reality

Virtual reality isn’t that virtual anymore. We are getting closer and closer to implying VR into our daily lives and social media platforms are no exceptions. Though we might not see a significant rise in the use of virtual reality technology in social media platforms this year, still we have some high hopes for 2018.

Must Read: Truly Inspiring Logo for your Business in 2018!

For instance, the social media giant Facebook is already working on a VR based project termed as “Spaces”. The concept behind the project is to enable friends to interact with each other in virtual reality. Interestingly, Facebook is also the owner of Oculus; a software and VR headset company and we won’t be surprised to see Facebook making this exciting jump this year. The company has already made clear their intentions to launch “Spaces” in 2018. If that is to happen, this will be the first VR experience for social media users.

  1. Devolution and Exodus

Every year we see dozens or more social media platform initiating offering their services to users. However, most of these new entrants disappear quickly without making any impact. Nonetheless, few still manage hold-on and break-into the domination of giant existing platforms. We are expecting to see the rise of some interesting social media platforms from the scratch for 2018 as well.

Even with all the algorithm complexities, data privacy concerns and controversies, the number of social media users continue to rise exponentially. This means that given the rightful and tactical strategy and a unique idea, a new platform can certainly make room for itself.

Moreover, we can expect to see people going for more niche-oriented social media platforms (a sort of decentralized form) from few congregating platforms like Facebook & Instagram.

Summing Up:

2018 is surely going to be one heck of a year for businesses and general users alike. For businesses, we are expecting to see increased spending over social media platforms while from a user point of view we can expect few interesting updates like VR or a unique decentralized and niche-oriented launch of new social media platform. Nonetheless, it is surely going to be a year worth experiencing!

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here