It is gearing up to be a big year for social media. We have been collecting the trends and below is the prediction for the main areas of growth.1. Facebook will come of age as the digital channel of choice.
Pearlfinders identifies the continued rise of FMCG brands spending online with the main themes being new product development and innovation. The top channels of choice are Digital, PR and Social. At current budget growth rates social will be number one by the end of the year.
2. The emergence of video micro-messaging
Services like Tout are gaining users quickly. The ability to upload a 15 second update and share it through your favourite social network is fast proving popular. Brands have noticed and early adopters ESPN are already up and running with brand pages.
3. Programming of consumer content
Vloggers and YouTubes continued move to original content channels inevitably points to aggregation. It isnt hard to see, given the viewership of Vloggers, that consumer generated content will be added to TV channels served through an HDMI cable to your TV set. Think reality TV but a little less scripted.
4. Piggybacking drives mobile / social convergence
YouTubes Android API is another tool helping social networks use other peoples apps to deliver content to mobile phones. Combined with Facebook app mobile compatibility this is going to provide increased convergence.
5. Social utility apps
On that convergence aspect, there is a lot of talk about social utility apps. Essentially this is an app that has long term usefulness rather than being a game or a competition. Mobile will greatly assist this so expect Facebook apps to start becoming a bit more interesting.
So to summarise, we will see more of Facebook everywhere, more video as it diversifies in content and things will become more useful to everyday life. IT is shaping to be a good year.
03.01.2013
By Julian Grainger
