2017 TRENDS – Social Media

To some people’s dismay, social media is not going away.  If anything, it is actually continuing to grow and has gone so far as to become a staple in people’s lives and even an important way of researching information, especially for the Millennial and Gen-Z generation.

Social Media

Social Commerce

Signs show that social commerce will continue to grow as new ways develop to drive revenue from social media.  While some businesses may not offer the right product for this direction, others will gain from it’s use.  You will have to decide if it’s right for your business.

Dark Social

Dark social is also on the rise.  If you’re like me, you may be wondering what the heck is “dark social”?  Is that new comic book character?  Actually, dark social is a term coined by Alexis C. Madrigal, a senior editor at The Atlantic.  Dark social refers to “the social sharing of content that occurs outside of what can be measured by web analytic programs.”  With dark social continuing to grow, businesses will need to search for alternate ways of tracking instead of traditional methods.

Video

While video has become of a huge star of 2016,  it is going to become even more prevalent in 2017, especially with advertising, particularly with videos that don’t need necessarily be heard but just viewed.  Reports show that many video viewers are watching the content with no sound.

– More than 45% of internet users view at least one video per month

– Every day approximately 100 millions of people watch one video or more

– 64% of people are more likely to make a purchase after watching a video

– 80% of viewers remember a commercial for 30 days after seeing it

– 92% of mobile users share videos they have seen online with others

– Humans perceive and process visual elements 60 thousand times faster than reading words

2017 Challenges

Hootsuite also talked about 3 key challenges social media will face in 2017:

Information, images and quotes taken from Hootsuite Social Media Predictions for 2017.