Photo credit: 2015calendars.org
Social media marketing veterans have three top predictions for 2016: video, video and video. Next year will see greater emphasis on video marketing, streaming video and even virtual reality videos.
Other predictions include more use of social media buy buttons, slower growth on Instagram due to advertising, and more attention to social media ROI. But more video marketing is by far most common social media prediction for 2016. Consumer demand for video is high, and social media platforms will continue to advance their products.
“Whether it’s Facebook Live, video on Twitter, Periscope, Blab, Instagram, Vine or the old standby YouTube, 2016 will be the year when video becomes a primary content and social marketing consideration for all brands – even B2B,” Jay Baer, president of Convince & Covert, told Top Dog Social Media.
New video options will provide marketers new opportunities to showcase products, employees, company facilities and anything else they might imagine, experts agree. Going forward, PR will be more likely to include video snippets with news releases, especially new product announcements. Video is also likely to become a more important element of corporate websites.
New Video Marketing Options
Expect to see more virtual reality videos, or at least certainly to hear more about VR video even if the technology is not widely adopted. New advances will transform smartphones into economical virtual reality devices, if not next year then in the relatively near future YouTube will struggle to maintain market share in the face of new streaming video tools on social media networks. In response, it will likely introduce new features.
It recently rolled out YouTube Red, a paid version that may allow it to compete against Netflix and Hulu. Many observers are question YouTube users will pay for a service they are accustomed to receiving for free, but YouTube believes better video quality and expanded options, such as downloading videos, will entice users, writes Seth Rand, Founder and CEO of Rand Internet Marketing for Business.com.
Facebook to Push Video Harder
Facebook will show no signs of relinquishing its crown as the dominant network. Although its U.S. market is saturated, it will gain new users overseas, especially in China.
Facebook will highlight its 360-degree videos, give Instant Articles greater prominence, and emphasize its improved Notes, the platform’s blogging option, writes social media consultant Andrew Hutchinson for Social Media Today. Although improved features and the network’s enormous reach may entice some bloggers, others will probably be leery of letting Facebook become their content landlord and being at risk of the network changing its rules.
Twitter Strives to Achieve Success
Twitter will innovate — or at least try to under recently appointed CEO Jack Dorsey. Twitter’s growth has slowed this year. Critics, perhaps unfairly comparing Twitter to Facebook, call it an underachiever. The network will continue roll out new features and changes. It has already introduced Moments and Polls and switched the favorite ‘star’ to a heart. It also deleted data about retweets which caused a good deal of market consternation.
Twitter may introduce a new emoji tool to give users the ability to replace the ‘like’ heart with any one of 36 emoji options, Hutchinson predicts. Emoji are tremendously popular and may increase engagement.
How effective Twitter’s changes will be in attracting users and increasing revenue remains to be seen. If it doesn’t succeed, the company may be acquired by Google. Rumors are circulating that Google is considering acquisition of Twitter to replace Google+. Twitter has already provided Google data for its search results, and Twitter’s small business groups worked with Google ads on a new marketing campaign.
Bottom Line: More social media marketers will embrace video marketing in 2016. Video is a powerful marketing and PR tool and social media networks are upgrading online streaming tools.
William J. Comcowich founded and served as CEO of CyberAlert LLC, the predecessor of Glean.info. He is currently serving as Interim CEO and member of the Board of Directors. Glean.info provides customized media monitoring, media measurement and analytics solutions across all types of traditional and social media.
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