Facebook vs. Twitter
In the beginning, there was Facebook, and it was good. During the first few years of Facebook, the internet world converted from being trusted MySpace users to Facebook fanatics. Now we are seeing those same users convert from Facebook to Twitter. Today, Facebook has 1.18 billion users and over half of them are active daily. However, Facebook has reached a plateau, especially with the younger generations from the age of 13-17. Brands are finding it increasingly difficult to master the platform and gain an active community without spending much effort in time and money.
This coming year, Twitter is becoming a public company and will throw the 7 year-old platform into the limelight. This is sure to create some public scrutiny, and in turn convince its bystanders to want a better understanding of the platform, which should convince many latent users to give Twitter another try.
Another study done by Pew Internet & American done earlier this year showed that many teens are switching from Facebook to Twitter and Instagram due to “less drama”.
Many businesses are already using Twitter as a customer service platform and seeing great results.
Snapchat Marketing
Snapchat is the new trendy was to send out video or picture messages known as “snaps”, that auto-delete after a short allotted time (1-10 seconds) set by the sender. A statistic from April of 2013 showed 5 million users were uploading 150 million photos daily. So what is the attraction? Snapchat gives you the opportunity to send “spur of the moment” messages.
This tactic is becoming more popular among brands as well. For instance, 16 Handles was one of the first brands to leverage the mobile application. With Snapchat’s recent launch of Snapchat Stories, brand marketers now have the opportunity to ask customers to share their stories, or interact with them to increase engagement.
Google+…Finally?
In the beginning of 2013, a study published on emarketer found that Google+ had now over 540 million active users, making it number two worldwide (after Facebook). With the recent introduction of Google Hummingbird and the evolution of Google Hangout, Google continues to push for perfection. Google+ remains the heartbeat of the strategy.
The question remaining is whether Google+ will garner more mainstream attention (such as getting people to stick around longer), and whether the platform will draw advertisers and marketers attention. Google+ is hoping for a promising year in 2014.
Videos
Last but certainly not least, videos should continue as the new and popular way to reach customers. Platforms such as Youtube show no signs of fatigue, in fact, Youtube has 100 hours of videos uploaded every hour.
However, brands have taken a liking to a promising new application, Vine, which offers 6 second videos capabilities, and following the trend is Instagram offering 15 seconds of video capabilities.
Be on the look out for these Social Media Marketing platforms in 2014!
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