The success of social media lies in the right mixture of fruitful strategies. The incorrect combination will simply reduce the traffic from targeted customers instead of attract them. In the event that you devise your social media marketing strategies such as social media optimization based on current trends, you can increase profits and use social media sites effectively for marketing. Here are the recent trends highlighted in an article published by Forbes based on the 2013 Social Media Marketing Industry Report.
Low Usage of SOCIAL BOOKMARK CREATING Sites
According to the research reports, using social bookmark creating sites has decreased to 10 percent from 26 percent in 2011. This considerable drop of usage clearly indicates nov bookmarking sites. Even though the sites including Twitter, StumbleUpon, Reddit and Pinterest remain popular among marketers, most sites (e.g. DIGG, Friendfeed) are almost dying. Therefore, it isn’t a good practice to trust a bookmarking site blindly for marketing purposes in today’s scenario. Instead, check for the sites that are hottest and perform the bookmarking very cautiously.
Decline of Daily Deal Sites
Daily deal features or just daily offerings of deals are regarded as a powerful way to attract a lot of targeted customers at a time. The research report says that around 80 percent of marketers aren’t interested in using the hottest daily deal sites including Groupon or Living Social because of their campaigns soon.
Now people concentrate more on the considerable amount of returns they receive from their purchases over time. Hence, it is advisable to use social media sites for longterm marketing goals instead of daily goals.
Top Sites for Social Media Campaigns
Marketers who use social media for marketing will obviously perform social media campaigns (using social media sites for promotion) because of their products or services to attract targeted customers. The campaigns will undoubtedly be successful only when the relevant site is popular amonst the customers.
The study report indicates that marketers who spend more than 40 hours a week for social media marketing perform their campaigns more intensely through Google+, You Tube, Pinterest and Instagram in comparison to those who spend six hours or less a week on social media. Also, around 92 percent of marketers who’ve five or more years of experience prefer LinkedIn than 70 percent of marketers having significantly less than five years of experience. Social Media Management agency has also decreased to 16 percent this season from 24 percent in 2011.
Around 67 percent of marketers are planning to increase campaigns through Twitter even though it is a slight decrease from 69 percent last year. Young marketers, more than older ones prefer photo sharing sites including Instagram for launching campaigns. 62% chose blogging because so many suitable platform to master, which is the highest one accompanied by Google + (61%) and Facebook (59%).
Trends of B2C and B2B Marketers
Business to Consumer (B2C) Marketers use Facebook at an increased rate of 67% than other platforms. Regarding Business to Business (B2B) marketers, both Facebook and LinkedIn have equal most 29% each. Given below may be the pie chart showing usage statistics for every platform pertaining to B2C and B2B marketers.
B2B marketers work with a more diverse selection of platforms in comparison to B2C marketers. Both of them usually do not completely utilize blogging and also have minimal You Tube usage.
If you are a B2B or B2C marketer, make an effort to encourage blogs as they are regarded as the most famous social media marketing platform. YouTube being the second largest search engine, you can enjoy the benefits it provides by posting low-cost videos. Orabrush (B2C Company) and Blentec (B2B Company) have become strong brands by using low cost YouTube videos.
As B2B marketers increasingly use LinkedIn, they have an opportunity to utilize SlideShare (owned by LinkedIn). This social media entity can be utilized for generating leads for B2B organizations.
Fewer Check-ins Online
As per the study reports, there is a reduction in the usage of geo-location services including Foursquare from 17% in 2011 to 11% this year. These services allow check-in to your locations automatically online. The decline in these kinds of services indicates that people are now concerned more about privacy and safety. Marketers can tackle this situation by introducing contests and rewards. This can encourage visitors to check-in more.
If you are still following old strategy for social media, then it is the time to develop new strategies predicated on all these current trends. It is best to entrust this tedious task to an established social media marketing company that provides reliable social media marketing services instead of try implementing the strategies on your own.