The Future of Social Media

With 2015 officially behind us, we can’t help but wonder where we can expect social media to take us in the year 2016.

With ever increasing advances in technology, the sky is truly the limit with how we communicate with the world, but there are a handful of social media trends that we can definitely expect to see in the coming year:

 

MOBILE SOCIALIZING

In 2015,   Twitter, YouTube and all other social portals reflect this mobile trend.

Mobile technology will continue to become more robust, which will only increase the number of users reaching for their phones, instead of their laptops, when they want to check their social networks.

 

“REAL TIME” UPDATES

With the advent of Periscope and the ever-increasing popularity of SnapChat, we can expect to see more videos on our favorite social platforms.  Even the heavy-hitters, like Facebook, are getting in on the video content game.

With video being one of the Internet’s most-consumed and most-demanded media formats, you can see why so many social networks are adopting this trend, and can expect to see even more of it in 2016.

 

PROFILE PERSONALIZATION

In the coming years, social networks will begin to place more importance on users’ profiles, and making sure that they are complete.  Social networks will become more focused on the user, collecting data and allowing profiles to contain much more information than they do now, making it easier for all users to better understand their personal connections and potential audience.  After all, people want to deal with people…that’s what social networking is all about!

 

SOCIAL SEARCHING

Social media trends for 2016 are pointing toward more tools and apps that will allow users to remain in their social network of choice when they want to search the web for information, read an article, or even purchase products.

Facebook has already integrated Instant Articles into their network, which allows users to stay right where they are to read content instead of being sent to an outside web page, and they are going to be launching their own search engine that they claim will rival Google.

 

SOCIAL SHOPPING

The trend of keeping social network users right where they are will be continued with even more use of the “buy button,” which we have already seen in use on both Facebook and Pinterest.  Although the ability to shop directly within social networks may still seem a bit foreign to us, it will most likely be a trend that continues to rise in 2016, so don’t be surprised to see them in use on all of the major social platforms before the end of the year.

 

DYNAMIC ADVERTISING

Social networks are the place where most people spend their spare time online, so it’s no surprise that they are also the biggest testing ground for new ad formats. Over the past several years, we have seen a trend towards dynamic image-based and video-based advertising, so expect to see more experiments in this field in 2016.

There’s no doubt that social media continues to change rapidly.  We have gone from a world of simply tweeting about our cat, to discovering the information that will help us to create more impactful and tailored messages.

What are your thoughts on our predictions?  Share your thoughts (and own predictions) in the comments section below.