Social media is more than selfies and documenting a play-by-play of your day. It can be a tremendous vehicle for promoting your business, building connections, and generating leads. No doubt, the fundamentals of any social media strategy are defining your goals, understanding your audience, and using the right content to target them. We can also count on social media platforms constantly changing to meet and exceed user experience. Whether you’re looking to evolve your existing social media strategy or are just getting started, we’ve collected five trends that will continue to rise in 2023 and shouldn’t be ignored.
1. Authentic Videos Will Rise
It’s no surprise that short-form videos still dominate on social media. However, the types of videos users want to see are shifting. When the short-form video first emerged, it was saturated with a lot of dancing, copycat trends, and trending audio voiceovers. This overload has caused viewers to lose interest. Now original, authentic, on-the-cutting room floor-type videos are driving engagement. From no-frills conversations to niche talking points, users are becoming more engaged with the realness in video versus carbon copies. Video editing is also becoming more about storytelling, with apps emerging to help create clever edits to help with quick transitions. . The best way to tap into this trend is to put your own unique spin on your video content. Transparency and brand authenticity are more important than ever. Users are interested in business owners and CEOs making a personal presence on social media and forming connections with their audience. Brands that tap into building deeper relationships with their customers will see benefits such as improved brand reputation and increased sales.
2. AI Will Play a Bigger Role
Artificial Intelligence is everywhere and even more accessible than ever. You’ll continue to see more and more recommended content all across social platforms to help drive engagement. AI is also moving into content development. AI tools such as OpenAI and ChatGPT are available to create content blogging, correct your copy, answer questions, analyze written content, and generate images and ideas. While AI can’t replace originality or personal experiences, we’ll see it play a big role in 2023 in helping develop better and more engaging content. Businesses will start adapting these AI tools to help with recommendations on increasing user engagement to customize posts and captions to reach their target audiences.
Another AI tool that’s transforming social media is text-to-image AI. This technology is enabling businesses to automate their images to create more personalized content. It helps brands create stunning visual images with nothing but written text. This text-to-image AI was recently added to graphic design platforms such as Canva. Marketers can simply enter their specific text prompt, and the AI generator will convert it to an original image that is tailored to the specific interest of their target audience.
3. LinkedIn Creators Will Grow
LinkedIn is steadily becoming the powerhouse you didn’t see coming. Why? The competition is still relatively low, so creators and influencers are using it to make their mark. And it’s working. Creators are taking to the platform to infuse their personality and expertise into their posts, which is fueling organic engagement. There’s also been an increase in LinkedIn “Power Users” that hire ghostwriters to pump out content to their followers. LinkedIn also offers Creator Accelerator – an initiative to help creators build their communities. This is a strong indication that LinkedIn is seeing the shift of Influencers on its platform and are ready to invest in it. Utilizing LinkedIn creator tools can help companies do more than generate leads. It can also help with customer engagement and promote a loyal following.
4. UGC-Inspired Content
User-generated content is incredibly popular and effective in purchase decisions with consumers. However, not every business out there has the means to churn it out or an in-house team to help create it. Enter UGC Creators. Similar to influencer marketing, these creators get paid to create UGC-inspired content for brands. The main difference between UGC creators and influencers is that UGC creators create and deliver to businesses without the obligation to post it on their channels. With influencers, the company pays for both the content and the exposure it gets to the influencer’s audience. UGC creators generate and narrate the content from their own perspective, which gives it an authentic feel, and one that users generally respond to. This can be a great tool for nano and micro-creators looking to find their place on social media by generating content that their users want to see.
5. Keyword Driven Content
Google pioneered keyword search to help connect users to content. Today, nearly every social platform is becoming its own search engine. In fact, nearly half of Gen Z is using TikTok and Instagram for search instead. This means that if you want your content to have a chance at getting discovered, you need to optimize all your posts and hashtags with keywords. People are using social media as more of an exploratory experience, and their search terms reflect that. Businesses need to be incredibly mindful of the words they utilize in their copy, and make sure they are aligning their keyword terms to what their target audience is using.
Keyword Driven content will also be important in the selling process for businesses. Because of the shift in storytelling and personal experience driving content on social media, selling on demand will be problematic on social media. Instead, businesses will need to create more “hand-raising” and conversation starter-type content that subtly drive their brand. Brands that position their product or services with specific problem-solving search terms relative to their audience’s search queries will find better success in nurturing their sales prospects.
Final Thoughts
While the use of social media and video isn’t changing, the methods to connect with the audience are. The idea is to create a sales funnel that starts first with building a community, and is centered around content that informs, impacts, and entertains. If people find your content worth consuming, you’ll organically move your prospects from cold traffic to a warm lead.
If you’re looking to stay ahead of the curve with social media, we can help. We build social media strategies that drive results for your business. Contact our team to get started.