Summary- do you keep seeing sponsored social media posts on your Facebook or Instagram accounts? Have these posts made you wonder if social media marketing is on a rise and could work for your business as well? The extracts here will highlight how it could be the future of digital marketing. 

The concept of social media was first introduced to society with six degrees in the year 1997. Ever since many such platforms were introduced, out of the lot many gained worldwide attention while some grew redundant. Initially, Social media was used as a means to connect or get in touch with friends/family or make new acquaintances. 

However today, it holds more importance to marketers because people can’t seem to get enough of it, and the obsession borders on addiction. Reasons why we use social media- 

• For staying updated on all the current events and top news clippings 
• To entertain yourself with the content of choice that is funny or informative 
• To ensure you are in contact with friends and acquaintances (as mentioned before) 
• Sharing of meme’s, videos, thoughts, opinions as posts with followers 
• Gather information and do background checks on new products before you buy it 
• Just to meet some new and likeminded people

An individual spends two hours and sometimes even more in a day surfing or scrolling through social media applications. In an article by the website broad and search “less than 2.5 billion people worldwide were using social media and by 2018 there were a solid 2.32 billion active monthly users on Facebook alone. By 2020 the same number jumped to 3.8 million, which tells us that the user will inevitably jump to a number that is much higher.” 

It is, therefore, no wonder that brands and companies invest more and more in running digital marketing plans on social media. This tells us that it is currently a crucial element for digital communications to take place. But what about the future? Will social media marketing grow to be the future of digital marketing? 

Statistics about the Rise of Social Media

To truly understand the rise of social media marketing it is important to mention that most access their social media accounts through smartphones. It was reported by a website named WE ARE SOCIAL in 2018. As of 2020, there are 3 billion of us who are using smartphones, making it easier to access apps like Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, or Snapchat.

The statistics mentioned below will bring to light more such eye-opening statistics. They outline why social media marketing is gaining momentum and why it could possibly be the future of digital marketing. 

• A website by the STATISTICA that publishes information regarding data management and statistics, etc mentioned that the 3.3 billion active social media users equal to almost 42% penetration. Following this, brands must think about optimizing their ad campaigns on the phones, also they tend to be slightly cheaper than the regular marketing campaigns. 
• According to the website MARKETING SHERPA that is a source of research and case studies for marketers mentioned that 85% of adults aged 18 to 34 are the ones who tend to follow brands on social media platforms. This brings to light that a brand must discover what platform their audience uses and accordingly make the account. 
• Website by the name SMART INSIGHTS commented that about 63% of the customers want companies to offer their customer services through the social media pages. It makes social media a good channel for customer care and mustn’t be neglected. 
• The social media market in the United States is currently dominated by two apps, YouTube (used by 68% of people) and Facebook (used by 73% people).
•  A report available on the official site of HubSpot mentions that the sharing of visual content on any social media platform is 40 times more than any other. So, if what you post is enticing to the viewers, they are likely to repost it to share with the people who follow them.  
• Your brand and service will see a 71% increased recommendation rate if a customer was satisfied with your customer service experience on social media accounts. So, it is always advised to stay vigilant and active on the social media accounts you create. It can successfully soar your brand engagement and reach new customers at the same time. 
• Another reason to make sure you maintain and keep a vigilant eye on your social media accounts is that as per an online survey “52% of the purchases made online were influenced by the Facebook recommendations and advertisements in 2015.” 
• There are over 50 million businesses large and small that created their own Facebook accounts for connecting with prospective customers. As many as 4 million of them spend money on paid advertisements and engagements for boosting their social media handles. 

Therefore, it can be concluded that social media marketing can succeed in the field of digital marketing. These statistics and projections mentioned above will tell you that social media marketing can help market your brand/service with relative ease! 

Why should you take advantage of Social Media Marketing? 

To further help you understand the advantages that social media marketing brings to the table and also why it could be the future of digital marketing. You should read the pointers mentioned below-  

It is cost-effective

Social media marketing can be an extremely cost-effective marketing channel. That is because of marketing because all you must do is set up your account and sign up FOR FREE. This pattern is followed by all social media platforms and can really help small businesses rake in modest amounts of money and splurge where the money really should be invested. It could be in areas like perfecting the product you’re selling and gathering more manpower. 

Will increase inbound traffic

Social media has a mixture of people on it that come from different backgrounds and possess different tastes. Their needs will be different and so will their surfing and searching habits. So, it will introduce your brand to all these other customers that you couldn’t have reached to otherwise.

This means if you use social media you may be able to find customers other than your target audience. It in return increases inbound traffic that would otherwise be restricted to the usual customers.

Increase of conversion rates 

As mentioned in the statistics section “sharing of visual content on any social media platform is 40 times more than any other content” so it is evident that content is key to attract entice your customer. Why? Well, it will add a humanization factor to your business/brand and that usually has a positive impact on people. Also, many marketers mention of there being a 51% more chance of increasing sales by making a closer connection with the follower. 

Another factor that could increase your brands conversion rate through Social media marketing is by keeping a tab of the likes and dislikes and general experiences with products. So, put your brand in such an atmosphere. 

It will help you understand your audience better 

Every post that you upload on your social media handles will gather views along with comments. Reading these comments as well can be eye-opening that is where people talk about what they liked or disliked about your post/product/service. Often people share lengthy opinions through the direct messages present on the social media platforms. 

These help you garner daily insights that ultimately help understand the behaviour of the consumer better. Through these, you can develop a social media marketing plan which makes sure the marketing of products/service is done in the manner they wish to see it.  

Have a Look at New trends on social media

Let’s look at examples of companies that we’re able to successfully grow leads through their social media marketing- 

Uber

As per the research analytics “84% of people base their purchasing decisions on the recommendations by peers.” This theory commonly known as WORD OF MOUTH was put to test by uber in one of their first social media marketing campaigns. The campaign involved sharing of the Uber code they received on their social media accounts and standing a chance to get a free ride. 

There was minimal expenditure involved in helping Uber reach a new set of customers and gain popularity.  

Fun fact- The popular tag line that is synonymous with uber “I’m going to uber it home tonight” was coined through social media. 

Pampers

You’d think advertising a baby product that is a commodity for babies would be easier to market. But if you think about it, diapers aren’t exactly glamorous products and marketing them on social media was rather difficult. So, the brand had to change tactics to ensure they make no mention of what a parent usually associates with being a new parent, i.e the multiple diaper changes, poop and stench.

The brand instead focused on the emotions a parent feels when they hold and caring for their new born that helped them stand out in the crowd. It was a sure shot way to tug at the heartstrings of their target market and leave a lasting effect as the message was clear and nothing very sales-y.

MoonPies 

 It is a popular American confection with a delectable marshmallow center and chocolaty exterior won many hearts over the years. They became a quick rage on Twitter by using a comedic approach instead of the regular route. So in 2017 when the American eclipse took place, brands took to social media to gain some action.

MoonPies, unlike the others, simply retweeted a tweet by Hostess Snacks with the caption “Lol ok” instead. The single tweet had a massive impact on the people that follow them as they broke the pattern and chose not to push out competing content but an irreverent message instead. 

A comedic approach and straying away from the usual pattern followed on social media too can work in your favor. Who doesn’t appreciate some light-hearted sarcastic jabs?

KFC 

This example is one of how KFC, a fast-food giant was able to turn their PR disaster into a successful social media marketing gimmick. In 2018 saw KFC facing major troubles when 750 of their eateries were shut down in areas of Ireland and the UK because of sudden supply issues. The loyal customers were obviously livid and even resorted to calling the cops regarding it. 

KFC instead of playing the blame game took to their social media handles to do some damage control. Their apology was short yet provided complete transparency and taking responsibility for the issue. They too had a comical approach to announce the eateries were back in action on Twitter.

KFC’s brand engagement head called this campaign and set of posts it involved “the brand being true to its behaviour.” The strategy humanized the brand and told customers that they care about them. 

Current social media marketing trends you must know

The social media platform sees continuous development and introduction of newer ways to help brands become closer to their customers/followers. Read about some social media marketing trends that you should give a try for the brand and business growth- 

AI and chatbots 

As mentioned in the advantages and the statics sections above, it is important to keep your customers engaged customers by responding to their queries. However, it not humanly possible to respond to all the queries that brands and companies tend to gather, which is where the chatbots come into play. What are they? Chatbots are a fresh new discovery that is basically artificial intelligence or AI software that can initiate conversations with customers without manual support.

The Facebook messenger is a good example where chatbots have been used by brands. Chatbots can do everything from resolving customer issues to sending promotion texts. You can easily create chatbots by finding an online chatbot builder.

Influencer Marketing 

This type of marketing is prevalent on social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Snapchat, etc. It involves paying the influencer for promoting your products and brand and on most occasions is part of a social media marketing campaign. To get their money’s worth brands narrow in on influencers that have a massive following to ensure they get their money’s worth. 

Background research must be conducted to find out which influencer will be able to catch your target audience’s eye best. You can do your influencer research through an online websites like the Fourstarzz Media or any other to simplify the search.

Tip- If you are low on budget then you can look into macro influencer marketing!

Stories 

The story feature was popularized by Snapchat and was quickly adopted by apps like Instagram and Facebook as well. It was simply because they feature allowed to allowed more interactive communication to take place. On average there are 500 million people who watch stories, telling us that they garner more attention than a regular visual post. 

To most millennials that possess a short attention span, the stories were a hit as they are short which ensure quick messages are conveyed in an engaging manner. There has been the addition of new features in the stories like stickers, gifs, the addition of music, running polls and also asking questions that can be answered at length. This is another aspect that heightened interactions

Programmatic Advertising 

It involves using artificial intelligence for the automation of ad buying’s. What does Programmatic advertising do? The automation of ad buying will help you reach the target audience of choice.  Automation of any process increases efficiency which will increase the conversion rates and lower the costs of customer acquisition. 

As per a study by eMarketer Programmatic advertising is infiltrating the Social media marketing scene and 86.2% of the digital ads displayed in 2020 are Programmatic. You can learn to use Programmatic advertising to your benefits by checking out a guide published by PPC hero! 

It must be said that applying the right strategy on any of the social media platforms will result in quality leads, sales as well as branding. The digital marketers will gather good ROI and a lot more that we have yet to discover. Space is still growing and possesses the massive potential to aid brands in generating a buzz.

Other trends like Live video and AR or Augmented reality have been introduced onto the platforms, they too can be included in your social media marketing campaigns. 

Conclusion 

While social media marketing may not be something that is new but it is growing and after much thought and research it can be called the future of digital marketing. Every person across the globe possesses at least one social media account, giving you the liberty to just reach out to them. As the technologies develop so the field of social media which directly impacts social media marketing! 

So, if you are a business looking to grow organically then you must put on your creative boots and device a social media marketing plan.

Author Bio: Name: Bhavik Soni

Bhavik Soni is a Creative Writer at Auto Monkey. We provide an original analysis of the latest happenings in the social media industry. Connect with Latest Social Media Trends and News plus tips on Twitter, Facebook and other social tools on the web.