It has been an interesting week in the world of social media.
- Former US President Donald Trump has announced his own social media platform
- Research says TikTok is to become the biggest social media platform by 2022
- Facebook is said to be changing its name
This article will investigate these new social media trends:
New social media? Free Speech? Propaganda?
The former US president’s new platform will be called Truth Social. He has promised it will “stand up to the tyranny of big tech,” following his indefinite bans from Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and some other social media channels.
Some supported the bans, whereas others felt they were unnecessary and an attack on free speech.
Trump has consistently used social media to key means communicate with his followers before, during, and after his presidency.
Truth Social is set to launch within the first three months of 2022, though an early version will launch next month for selected guests.
The social platform functions similarly to that of Twitter which has 300 million-plus users.
The real question for us, though, is how will Truth Social shape marketing?
Perhaps they will offer paid ads in the same way as Twitter or Facebook, or maybe they will offer a new marketing model.
Only time will tell.
TikTok growth
It has been speculated that TikTok will become the most prominent social media app by next year, even overtaking Facebook, which is currently the largest.
According to Talkwalker, a consumer intelligence and social listening platform, it will become the top social media platform next year.
Again, if you look at this through a marketing lens, there are several ways social media marketing may change due to this.
Businesses are being widely encouraged to start using TikTok for marketing purposes. With the platform offering advertising and influencer marketing opportunities, TikTok has become an excellent and contemporary way for companies to expand their reach and sell their products.
With TikTok’s exponential growth, perhaps businesses will begin to invest more in using the platform for marketing. For instance, they may stop spending as much on their Facebook ads in favour of TikTok-based campaigns.
Evolution of Facebook
Lastly, Facebook has announced it will be rebranding under a new name. The name change is expected to happen in the coming weeks, and official sources have stated that this is to push into the so-called “metaverse.”
The term metaverse is a broad term. In science fiction, you could probably apply the term to films such as The Matrix or Ready Player One, where characters exist digitally and physically, and both selves are connected.
In reality, what Mark Zuckerberg actually means is that he wants to see Facebook integrated with virtual reality elements and other more “futuristic” forms of technology. By this, he means virtual reality headsets and smart glasses. Facebook currently sells its own VR headsets, having purchased VR company Oculus back in 2014.
What we are interested in is how this might change marketing. You might be surprised to know that VR marketing is already a thing, albeit very niche.
Soft drink company Mountain Dew has previously used VR marketing, featuring 360-degree videos that can be accessed via VR headsets, immersing the viewer in the advert.
With Facebook’s plan to build upon this kind of technology, perhaps in a few years, more businesses will tailor their marketing strategies accordingly and start using VR adverts.
It is an exciting time for the marketing industry, with more and more opportunities appearing as social media has begun to evolve.
Seeing as we can only predict how the changes in social media will affect marketing,
It’s both an exciting and scary time in the world of social media, with lots of imminent changes. While we can speculate how these changes may shape the marketing industry, seeing how things actually turn out will be interesting.
The digital transformation has brought us platforms such as Bebo and Myspace, which were eventually replaced by the likes of Facebook and Instagram. We see another change in dominance in that field, with TikTok rising to the top of the game. Who knows what kind of platform will come next?
Regardless, businesses have always adapted and been able to market on whichever social media network exists at the time, so we have every faith that they will continue to do so regardless of what platform they have available to them.
