We cannot deny the fact that most people these days spend a good part of their days on social media platforms. Social media channels such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Connected have become inseparable from people’s lives, and now most are so used to it that the first thing they do in the morning is to look at their social media feeds.

The time is ripe for social media to adapt itself to the changing mindset of people, and that’s why it is constantly evolving as more and more people are joining it. It’s not easy to think how it will look like in the near future. Therefore, Social Media need to keep pace with the requirements of users as brands continue to modify their strategies once new trends emerge. 

If we look at the Importance of Social Media in our lives, companies, and brands have created a sizeable presence on various social platforms to get engaged with their target audiences. The key to using social media for business lies in staying updated on the latest social media trends that help to fuel your strategy and make you stand apart in the crowd. In 2021, these are the most likely social media trends that businesses need to be aware of.

 

Primacy of Short-Duration Content 

Short-duration contents are only available for a limited period that subsequently disappears. Snapchat, Facebook, and Instagram Stories fall into this category. These days, people’s attention spans have become shorter, and their methods of consuming content have also changed. 

Therefore, new formats like Stories have gained a lot of popularity. These are normally short, engaging, crisp, and interesting which makes people spend long hours going through one Story after another. This is why platforms such as Instagram experienced such a phenomenal rise. 

 

Expansion of E-Commerce 

Businesses have been using social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest to promote their products for quite some time. Now, E-commerce on social media has become a big retail outlet for brands, and this trend will likely become even stronger with more and more social networks introducing features like commercial posts. 

Social media commerce is all set to become a major retail channel at par with other avenues like websites and brick-and-mortar stores. Now, social networks are virtually morphing into retail platforms by incorporating commercial posts, and Instagram Storefronts. Brands and marketers will keep using these features by incorporating social commerce into their sales strategies.

Video Content Will Reign Supreme

When it comes to engaging with users, video content is often very useful, and in all likelihood, it will dominate social media in the near future. Whether it’s short-form videos like we see on TikTok or the long-form videos found on YouTube, both will grow in popularity as social media content. 

According to a study conducted by Cisco, by 2022 almost 82% of all online content will be in video format. This is a clear indicator of why it is important to use video content to stay relevant in the social media domain.

In case, if currently, your focus is not on making videos, it is the right time to include them in your content strategy. Because from now on, videos will reign supreme on social media, and those who haven’t realized their true potential will find it tough to cope up. 

It will be better if you start using features like Stories for your social media content as soon as possible. Ideally, you should tag videos along with your social media posts, even on channels that are still dominated by text content.

Live-Streaming Will be on Demand

The year 2020 was unprecedented on account of a deadly pandemic as it made businesses turn on its head. With strict regulations of a lockdown and social distancing, the entire retailing landscape was changed to make shopping convenient. 

People had no option but to carry out their businesses online. Even those who never participated in online conferencing began enjoying Google meet or Zoom meetings. Elderly citizens, who never owned smartphones before 2020 had to adapt to live- streaming, and online chat.

Whether the pandemic situation improves in 2021 or not, live streaming is here to stay, as people find it more convenient to interact with brands in online mode. They can remain at their homes to see or purchase a product. 

Social Media can Badly Impact the youth that causes depression. so we have to start making some distance to social media apps. That can help to improve mental health.

 

Increased Privacy and Security

The latest trend in social media demands brands to get engaged with consumers and implement innovative ways of building consumer trust. Moreover, privacy concerns have become a very sensitive issue for consumers, because now social media users are becoming more aware of how their data is being used. 

The future of social media will most probably witness an increase in cases where users will prefer getting connected to mediums like Dark Social. You will be shocked to know that now 84% of all consumers’ outbound sharing from websites is already channelized through Dark Social channels, and this will further see an increase in the next couple of years.

 

Flood of Memes

A channel like Facebook saw a drop of almost 21% in original, personal updates in 2016 because now users are communicating more with Shared Articles and Memes. Users worldwide are now sharing less personal information on leading networks, and rather prefer to showcase external content such as a funny meme, or an interesting video. 

 

Premium Services with Lesser Ads

Traditionally, advertisements have always been considered an avoidable interruption for most social media users, and now they really seem exhausted. Now more users will migrate to premium services as social media users tend to prefer high-quality images, videos, and audio. What needs to be seen is whether they will also spend money on it.

 

Focus on Mobile Devices

There is no second opinion about the fact that the future of social media is closely linked to mobiles and smartphones. According to a recent survey, by the end of 2021, approx. 3.5 billion people will own mobile phones. More people will be connected to smartphones than ever before which will be their primary device for accessing social media platforms.

Therefore, future platforms will be designed to keep the new social media lifestyle in mind from the very beginning.

Read more: What is SMO and How We Plan Social Media