Massive changes occurred in social media during 2014. New platforms were created, advertising strategies and platforms continued to develop, and more people were using social media than ever before. The numbers, as always, tell the story: in 2014, approximately 1.79 billion people were using social media, and those numbers are expected to increase to 2.5 billion by 2018. In order to find their target audiences, businesses go where people are, so it is little wonder that social media marketing is experiencing the growth it recently has. In saying that, there needs to be some flexibility with these changes. While there have been many predictions out there about what will happen, no one can be 100 percent certain of any of them. Thankfully, the advent of new technologies will help any social media agency keep their strategy flexible for the future.
Companies want to make sure they are getting a worthwhile return on their investment when implementing a social media marketing strategy. Tracking accurate results from your social media efforts has been difficult in the past, but developing technology is making it much easier and much more accurate. Social media analytics have grown over the past year, allowing it to be an effective tool for social media companies to wield. This has given them the ability to target specific audiences, giving them added flexibility when reaching more people through engaging content. For years, marketers have used their customer databases to tailor campaigns designed to engage their audience, but this task has become so much easier now with help from analytics. The positive effects are being felt from large companies’ right down to small companies who, with limited budget, are now able to compete with these larger companies and take their fair share of the market.
One of the most promising new developments for any social media agency has been the growth of the Internet of Things. Up until recently social media marketers were solely relying on social media data from the website activity of a user from their desktop or mobile device. The advent of wearable devices opens up a whole new dimension for marketers to explore and a whole new way of using and analyzing a new collection of data. Several experts are predicting that 2015 will see a surge for wearable devices and the Internet of Things, and the social media data that is collected will help marketers in their campaigns in ways like we have never seen before. This will go beyond where customers are located when they receive ads and offers. Like most new technology, it may take a while for marketers to fully grasp the power of wearable devices, but once they do, it’ll add even more flexibility in the content they produce.
In addition to this new technology and more in-depth analytics, marketers are also taking advantage of the growth of social media as a whole. Facebook, Twitter and Instagram will continue to dominate the majority of the landscape, but niche social websites are entering the market at a rapid pace. Based off of these developments, a social media agency is able have a better understanding of what websites their targeted audience is visiting, thus giving them more flexibility in creating campaigns that is built on a tighter focus.
So what does this mean for you and your business in 2015? As any social media agency will tell you, your approach to your campaign will continue to change as per the results it delivers based on your analytics. With the development of technology such as wearable devices and further analytic capabilities, businesses are now going to be able to gain a more in-depth understanding of where their customers are and how they can reach them. From there, businesses will be able to create specific campaigns off of the back of the data they have collected. This is going to be highly beneficial to a business’ bottom line as they should begin to see more growth through their more advanced social media efforts.
