2024 Social Media Marketing Predictions
We have yet again wrapped up another year of social media advertising, and what a bizarre year it has been. Meta released their newest app ‘Threads’, and rolled out some impressive new AI features for advertisers. Pinterest released several new product updates. LinkedIn improved the functionality of posting for businesses allowing business pages to schedule posts. And of course, there was a multitude of changes with Twitter rebranding to X adding to the chaos.
2023 was jam-packed, it is hard to say what will happen in 2024. We’ve done some sleuthing in the world of social media marketing and making predictions for the next 12 months. Let’s see how accurate these are – check back with us here in 2025…
Meta
More AI, More Video
This will come as no surprise to those who’ve seen the changes Meta has made within the paid ad realm. Facebook is continuing this trend and will continue to integrate more AI tools and recommendations.
Meta’s feed is taking a page from TikTok’s playbook, prioritising broader, discovery-focused content over personalised posts from your social circle. This is similar to TikTok’s “For You” feed. It uses advanced algorithms to constantly learn from users’ past engagement to curate a stream of “might-like” content.
With this new feature, users see a broader range of content. This is unlike the traditionally personalised content from friends, pages, and groups, that users may be interested in.
We’ve already witnessed Meta dabbling in AI-Generate backgrounds for posts or AI-generated stickers. The digital marketing community is predicting that Meta will heavily lean on having more AI-based experiences within its apps. The experiences include items such as post prompts, AI-generated quizzes, AI-generated video creation tools, AI-generated ads, and much more.
Predictions also indicate that Reels will continue to dominate user’s feeds. This means businesses will need to ensure that their content is more entertaining, engaging, and palatable for a wider audience.
Messaging Tools For Business
Currently, creators have “broadcasting” chats for their followers, so alternatively for businesses, Meta will allow private messaging groups. This provides the ability to share their latest updates, and product launches rather than posting these publicly. Loyal customers and people who want to keep up to date with specific businesses will now feel a sense of community. Potentially with the rollout of this tool, undoubtedly Meta will also roll out AI chatbot features for businesses.
AR Shopping Activations
A big opportunity for Meta is to show business products in a real-life scenario. This could include clothing items, furniture, and other displays/activations. There are predictions that Instagram will fill this gap in the market by offering in-store AR integrations. Products will be viewed and experienced in real life such as home decorations etc.
Meta has already started making headway with developing 3D product display tools as a part of their Meta Lattice. This would also align quite well with their AR glasses that are in development alongside their Virtual reality experiences.
Source: https://www.facebook.com/business/news/expanding-access-to-ar-try-on-new-apis-ads-formats
Evolution of Meta Threads
The initial rollout of Threads had significant growth, attracting 30 Million users in less than 24 hours of the app launching. However, it’s just going to get bigger, as Meta looks to be developing products within the app, such as messaging options. It will only be a matter of time before businesses will be able to run ads through the Threads app too.
It’s expected that Threads will continue to grow and even match/surpass X’s (previously Twitter) numbers by mid-2024 (Hutchinson, 2023). That doesn’t mean that X will be “beaten” by Threads, more so that Threads will have a wider reach making it more desirable for marketers.
AR Try on Advances
Alongside the AR shopping activations that Meta may create, it is in the same vain that Pinterest will have the same sort of product. Allowing users to “Try on” elements of products to further enhance Pinterest’s in-app experience.
Source: https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/34-predictions-social-media-marketing-2024/697420/
Virtual Wardrobe
Predictions are alluding that Pinterest will roll out a product that will allow a user to take a photo of their clothing, and help them find recommendations for “outfit ideas” based on what you already own. Pinterest has this to some degree called Pinterest Lens’ however, they may lean towards more recommendations and aligning this with users behaviours and interests.
Video events & Video streams
LinkedIn already has video events and video content in app, however, the issue is it’s hard to stumble upon. You either have to already be following said person / their content or you’ve been invited. Therefore, the prediction here is to have a swipeable page from the main LinkedIn feed (like Meta) to browse live events.
This will be a big win for businesses who do virtual events or need to use video streams, as this allows said business to be easily found/discoverable to newer users.
Things are forever changing in this digital landscape, and of course, it’s impossible to predict exactly what will be coming along over the next 12 months. However, with these predictions, we’re aiming to keep on the front foot and to be as ready as possible for the changes ahead.
Get in touch to see how we can help you plan your digital strategy for the year ahead.
References:
Hutchinson, A. (2023). New report highlights threads Q3 rise and broader app download and usage trends. Retrieved from https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/new-report-highlights-rise-threads-in-q3-along-broader-app-download/696900/
