Social Trends 2021. The confirmations and innovations you need to know to build a successful strategy
The Covid 19 pandemic has literally revolutionized our lives, styles, habits, and daily practices. On a social level, opportunities for real contact with people have decreased, and conversely, digital contact has increased, with an exponential increase in the uses of digital technologies and platforms. In recent months, social networks have recorded staggering numbers. According to Comscore, which analyzed user behaviors during the lockdown and in the period since, there has been a significant increase in time spent on social, especially among young people: in terms of time spent, Facebook is the leading social with 26 average minutes per day per user and a growth of +49% over the previous year, followed by Whatsapp with 20 average minutes per day per user and a growth of 81%. In terms of reach, on the other hand, Youtube is the most used social, followed by Facebook, Whatsapp and Instagram. TikTok, on the other hand, is the platform with the highest growth rate.
We do not know with certainty what will happen health-wise and socially in the coming months, but it is clear that even if the pandemic ends, the consequences that Covid 19 has had on our lives have been so impactful that they will leave indelible traces for years to come. Users and consumers have significantly altered content consumption practices, modes of interaction, and purchasing habits, and all of this is unlikely to change.
In this article, we will try to analyze what will happen on social networks, to understand what consumers expect and like, as well as how brands will have to orient themselves to devise strategies that are capable of meeting these needs and are functional for achieving objectives, including and especially business objectives.
- Social platforms, formats, content: what will change?
Let's dispel a myth right away: in 2021, Facebook will not die and, indeed, will continue to be the world's number one social platform by number of users. Instagram will continue to be the social media with the highest degree of user engagement (the realm of influencers!) while LinkedIn will continue its rise to the Olympus of the professional sector, with its users continuing to use it more and more for personal branding. One cannot overlook TikTok, which is expected to continue its growth trend in 2021. The target audience, of very young people and teenagers until a few months ago, has grown, and will soon be around a range of users who are already of age and consumers at all levels. We can say in general that there will be no upheaval in today's dominant social platforms: they will certainly change, adapting to the trends of the moment and the tastes of the users, as also happened recently with the advent of Instagram's Reels (very similar to TikTok's videos) or Linkedin's stories.
In this ever-changing scenario, 2021 will mark important confirmations: among them, the strength of groups, which will also in 2021 be the privileged places where users gather to exchange their opinions, leave their reviews, discuss social issues, and build relationships in the digital world. Among the 2021 confirmations will attest to the great success of videos, which will continue to be users' favorite format. There will be an increase in live streaming and an increase in the popularity and use of "short videos": the Reels of Instagram, precisely, and TikTok. Brands will have to adapt to these new formats, being able to tell the story of their products or services in a very short time and with increasingly appealing creativity. And not excluding being able to involve their users more and more in the creation of content. In the near future, user generated content will play an increasingly important role, stimulated especially by TikTok, and Reels. In the coming months, we will see a growth in remixing: brands will inspire their followers to reproduce their content in their own way, providing them with creative assets, equipping them with templates, tools and resources to create original content, generating very high engagement on social.
- Covid's legacy: empathy and nostalgia for communication close to the user.
As we said, if the tastes and habits of users move the changes of platforms, brands will have to adapt, both in the use of the different and new tools provided by social and in the communication and content offered.
In this scenario still dominated by the pandemic, brands will have to try to build an increasingly deep and empathetic relationship with their customers: analyses of their online conversations, concerns and desires will be essential in defining any communication and marketing strategy, including on social. At the content level, highly emotional and evocative content will need to be created. As soon as the pandemic crisis hit our lives, social media monitoring platforms recorded a significant increase in keywords related to nostalgia or remembrance (Source Talkwalker "Social Media Trends 2021") . For this reason, nostalgic content, which creates a connection with positive memories of the past, will grow in 2021 to try to respond to the sense of loneliness and uncertainty for the future.
- An imperative? Talk to the audience and reveal the human side of the brand to them
Gartner was already talking about it in 2018, but the trend of conversational marketing, or that type of marketing based on the conversation between brand and customer after 2020 can no longer be an accessory. Establishing a relationship with the customer, talking to him, responding to his requests, building a conversation, will be real imperatives. It will therefore be necessary to study one's audience, understand what their thoughts are, study their characteristics, as well as use a "softer" and more natural tone of voice, and create content functional to this, increase the time and resources devoted to messaging. As reported in Hootsuite's latest annual report, currently, people and organizations exchange more than 20 billion messages per month on Facebook Messenger-a figure ten times higher than in 2016. This figure will continue to increase in the years to come, with the growing need for businesses, large and small, to adapt to this new challenge by responding to messages on an individual basis. Certainly, there will be a great use of Bots, but it will be necessary not to go overboard with automation, to avoid abandonment by users "frustrated" by the absence of human interaction.
This openness to listening and relating will expose brands to the need to show their "human" side. The market will reward authentic brands, perceived as real, honest and transparent. Brands will have to reveal their face, present themselves to the public as if they were a real palace of glass, and take a stand, including with respect to issues such as environmental protection, inclusiveness, and sustainability to meet the expectations of their potential customers.
Only those who expose themselves and put themselves out there will be able to inspire a sense of belonging and shared values in the audience. This step will make it possible to turn the customer into a brand ambassador, who will leave positive reviews and defend the brand in less positive conversations. The more customers who speak well of the brand online, the greater the returns for the brand.
- The exploit of social commerce and influencer marketing
Speaking of business returns,,, in the pandemic period even micro and small businesses have realized the importance of being and selling online, compelled by the inability of customers to physically go to the point of sale and with the prospect of reaching a much larger, potentially huge audience, freed from territorial limits.
The year 2021 will be the year of theexploit of social commerce, the perfect combination of social networks and e-commerce. And if until now social allowed to create a showcase of products that allowed users to receive all the information regarding the characteristics of the offer and its prices, soon even in Italy Facebook and Instagram in the first place, then also Messenger and Whatsapp will allow all businesses to sell directly without leaving the platform.
This opportunity represents a real innovation in the world of online shopping, but also in social media marketing, since it will allow companies to more accurately verify the return on investment.
In business, 2021 will see a confirmation of the success ofinfluencer marketing, which, however, as Buzoole explains in its report "Influencer Marketing Trends 2021," will be increasingly characterized by "quality, control and evolvedmeasurement." No longer improvisation, but quality assurance and above all verification of the impact of influencer marketing on brand kpi.
- l gaming and augmented reality
In the period of lockdowns and social confinement in general, there have been a great many users who have chosen video games, especially those involving multiple users at the same time. Considered a form of distraction, they have become-and will remain so in the coming months-a popular way to meet people, network and socialize. The communities that have sprung up on social media and are linked to these games have recorded staggering numbers.
Depending on the growth of gaming and the whole universe around it, it is not excluded that in the near future gaming platforms and social may not gradually "con-fuse." Augmented reality will play a prominent role. Facebook's Aria project (https://www.facebook.com/facebook/videos/327314611690237/), which plans to make new generation of wearable devices in augmented reality, is just one example.
Let us prepare, then, for a series of important innovations. The future is upon us, even on social.
Annalisa Nastrini
Brand Ambassador Digital Innovation Days