Infographic: Social Media Trends that Will Shape 2018
Explore 9 key social media trends set to impact on us next year - from the growth of social video and the expansion of live streaming, through to an increased investment in influencers and the importance of mobile ready social content.
Even though it is still a bit early to summarize 2017, it is safe to say that this year has been a successful one for social networks like Facebook or YouTube. For the first time since it was founded 13 years ago, Facebook has reached a 2 billion active monthly users mark, which makes it by far the largest social network today. YouTube, on the other hand, had 1.5 billion active monthly users in June 2017, the highest amount of users in its little over a decade-long history. These numbers clearly show that the Internet audience is expanding and that these platforms are rapidly becoming powerful advertising tools.
What's more, their growth doesn't show the signs of slowing down, and it can be anticipated that this trend will continue in 2018. As a matter of fact, new features that broaden the marketing possibilities are implemented at an astounding rate.
Scroll down to find out more about the hottest social media trends in 2018 in this infographic made by Filmora.
Live Streaming Takes the Center Stage
It has been only six years since the first live streaming app has been launched, and since then all the major social networks have implemented live streaming on their platforms. Some studies have shown that 80% of customers would prefer to watch a live video streamed by a brand than to read a post. To make things even more interesting, it is estimated that by 2020 80% of Internet traffic will be generated by video content and the video streaming market could easily become $70,5 billion industry by 2021 if its growth continues at this pace.
A part of the reason why the advertising world loves videos is the fact that videos increase user engagement since an average video viewer retains 95% of messages contained in a video and just 10% from written messages. These statistics clearly show that live video streams, as well as all other sorts of videos, are going to become an even more important factor on the Internet in 2018. 87% of Internet marketers are already using videos in their efforts to reach as many potential customers as they possibly can, and there is no reason to believe that this number will decrease in the future.
The Rise of the Generation Z
Young people are the future of this planet and the demands of the generation born between 1995 and 2012 are slowly starting to make an impact on the market. As of today Generation Z already has $44 billion of buying power and this number will continue to grow as the time passes. For that reason, brands and companies will have to adjust their offers to meet the demands of this rising force on the market.
The true digital natives as they are sometimes called, are already a significant part of the Internet's audience and the ability to provide them with the products they need can make or break brands.