The year social matured.
The entire industry continues to recalibrate their mindset on social. Is it tactical, is is about community management and customer service or is it really about real time insights? All of the above (plus, 100 other things). But, social has matured and is now a core function or marketing — not a “really fun, cool add on.” We live in a social world, and here’s the reality of how social has matured.
Existing social platform use has steadied amongst consumers — leaving room for emerging platforms of course, but I’m not certain we’ll see the hockey stick growth patterns of years past. Because of that, brands will be able to take a time out, recount the successes/failures of their pilots from 2013, get their footing, and most importantly the appropriate BUDGET according to a survey from CMO.org.
I think we’ll see:
- Investment in customer insights and analytic software
- Social diversification: matching content and cost to the right platforms/consumers
- Marketing leaders will gain additional headcount, and hire talented individuals (vs. interns) and integrate social into their discipline
- Measuring (and making sense of) quality engagement metrics vs. only quantitative ones
The winners will be the ones who invest in quality talent, to collect the right insights to keep their audiences engaged across multiple platforms (desktop mobile, tablet). Want more stats? There’s expanded reading on it from the Altimeter Group here and the Harvard Business Review: What’s the End Game for Social?
The trend: Building marketing efforts around shifting and sometimes transient customer behaviors — “Marketing For a Social World”.
Interested in learning more about trends in social media? Join us at at Social Media Week New York February 17-21 at the Highline Stages.
Jess Seilheimer runs a consultancy called Cretegic– your insight-driven partner for a digital world. We accelerate strategic planning into actionable ideas & marketing for brands and startups. She is also the Strategy & Marketing lead for a startup Birdi. Prior, she was the SVP of Digital Innovation and Strategic Planning at Havas.
Image courtesy Engagor.