7 social media trends for 2018

1. 7 SOCIAL
MEDIA
TRENDS FOR
2018
December 2017

2. RECAP: 7 TRENDS WE IDENTIFIED FOR
SOCIAL MEDIA IN 2017
TREND ONE: THE AUGMENTED REALITY WAR
HOW DID WE DO: A win. Facebook launched an augmented reality camera effects platform. Facebook and Instagram introduced selfie filters. Facebook developed branded filters. This is just the start,
however. “Simply put, we believe augmented reality is going to change the way we use technology forever” Tim Cook, Nov 2017.
TREND TWO: ADVERTISING THAT MAKES THE INDIVIDUAL THE STAR
HOW DID WE DO: One for the future. Facebook had a plethora of brands experimenting with branded filters, including Rimmel who used it to show users how four different Rimmel eyeliners would
look on their face and Nike using filters to overlay a sweatband on a user’s head and pull in a map of their running route. Facebook, however, hasn’t monetised these filters as an advertising product.
Yet.
TREND THREE: FROM PASSIVE SCROLLING TO REACHING PEOPLE WHEN THEY’RE ALREADY ENGAGED
HOW DID WE DO: A win. Ads, including the canvas format, were launched on Instagram stories in 2017. Mid-Roll ads were introduced into Facebook’s advertising inventory with mixed results. With the
launch of the watch tab Facebook is introducing pre-roll and mid-roll ads will only run on longer videos (not the 90secs as before)
TREND FOUR: SEARCH BEING TIED INTO SOCIAL MEDIA ADVERTISING
HOW DID WE DO: A win. Pinterest rolled out their targeted ads based on searches to everyone in October. At the start of the year advertisers could use Google search for targeting on YouTube and
now advertisers can target users who search on Google Maps or download an app.
TREND FIVE: THE (FORCED) EMBRACE OF SHORT FORM VIDEO ADVERTISING
HOW DID WE DO: A win (although it’s nothing new.) Facebook have been preaching the three second rule for a while. YouTube followed suit introducing the bumper ad format. A slow phasing out of
simply placing a TVC on social channels
TREND SIX: LONG FORM VIDEO CONTENT FINDING A HOME ON FACEBOOK
HOW DID WE DO: A win. Facebook launched its Watch tab in the US in August. Results, however, have been mixed with publishers finding the majority of views still coming from the news feed. To
incentivise publishers, Facebook announced a tweaking of the algorithm to favour videos in Watch’s discover section
TREND SEVEN: THE BRAND AS A BROADCASTER
HOW DID WE DO: A mixed bag. From Virgin Media using live stream to hijack The Crown premier to Lowe’s creating a 17min DIY Escape room episode on YouTube (5.6m views) brands are starting to
co-opt the social tools available to be broadcasters.
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3. 7 TRENDS FOR SOCIAL MEDIA IN 2018
1. VISUAL SEARCH STARTS TO ENTER THE MAINSTREAM
2. SOCIAL COMMERCE TO BECOME A THING (NOT JUST A THING TALKED ABOUT)
3. THE RESURGENCE OF BOTS, LESS CHAT MORE A MOBILE SITE
4. INSTAGRAM AS THE REAL INFLUENCER
5. ALGORITHMS TO BE A HOT TOPIC. AGAIN
6. INFLUENCER BACKLASH, MEH. INFLUENCERS WILL INCREASE THEIR PROMINENCE
7. THE GROWING ROLE OF MESSENGER IN THE SOCIAL MEDIA ADVERTISING MIX
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4. VISUAL SEARCH STARTS TO ENTER THE
MAINSTREAM
4
What does it mean for brands: More ways to reach your customers. Advertising
optimised to what people are visually searching, The further fragmentation of traditional
search and social networks staking their claim in this new territory.
2018 Impact level: 7
Google Assistant Pinterest
“I really believe that the camera will be the next keyboard. It will be a fundamental tool you
use to query the world around you, discover things around you, or visualize how something
might fit into your life.” Pinterest CEO Ben Silbermann.
Pinterest expanded their visual search ability in 2017 with the introduction of a lens that
enables users to point their camera at something and find additional information for it —
such as a price tag, where to buy it, or what they can do with it. A partnership with Target
will place the Lens into the retailer’s app and website, allowing Target shoppers to snap a
photo of any product and find similar items for sale at Target..
Visual search will benefit in scale with Google’s plans to use Google Lens in Pixel phones-
the Lens can read text , identify buildings and landmarks, provide information on artwork,
books and movies and scan barcodes. It can also identify products .
Arguably a camera provides a more familiar tool for search than voice- and with Google,
Facebook, Microsoft, and Amazon pouring resources into visual search it seems a matter of
when, not if, it becomes integrated into audience behaviour.

5. SOCIAL COMMERCE TO BECOME A THING
(NOT JUST A THING TALKED ABOUT)
5
Social commerce in the West has been a thing discussed fervently for years now, but with little impact. Consistently social media users
were unwilling to think of social as a commerce channel. There are signs, however, that the winds are changing.
A different mindset: nearly 33% of users aged between 18 and 24 like purchasing directly from Facebook, while 20% prefer Twitter and
27%, Instagram
Ease, suited to a mobile first experience: As we gravitate towards a mobile first society, it’s a more straightforward user experience to
purchase via a post than navigate a confusing mobile website.
Better formats: social platforms are introducing more efficient formats to take advantage of circumstance and mindset. Facebook has
shoppable videos, Instagram has teamed up with shopify to allow tagging of products that are available for sale, and then letting users
purchase them directly within the app. Liketoknowit allows users to shop the screenshot and Messenger and bots are blurring the lines
between websites and conversational commerce.
What does it mean for brands: Social commerce provides the opportunity to take the audience through the purchase stages.
From social being focused to inspire implicitly to social commerce offering an explicit brand endpoint. 2018 might be baby
steps, but the foundation should be established to normalise the idea of buying on social for audiences’.
2018 Impact level:7

6. THE RESURGENCE OF BOTS, LESS CHAT
MORE A MOBILE SITE
6
Bots were predicted to be the next big thing when they were launched with fanfare at Facebook’s F8 conference in 2016. And
then the reality set in. The seamless automated conversation bots were supposed to be delivering was limited at best, a
frustrating user experience ensued and the stymieing of any snowball effect. 2017 was a revaluation. Endless conversation
was replaced with a structured decision tree network, automated conversation was complimented with interactive menus and
carousels to help narrow choice and produce an end result. The result is that bots are starting to resemble mobile websites,
rather than offering a purely conversational output (replicating a format that’s been so successful for WeChat in China).
This new simpler to understand audience format feeds into what made bots such an exciting prospect in the first place.
Tapping into the two major trends of the moment, a mobile first society and the explosion of peer-to-peer messaging apps,
bots give brands the opportunity to reach the customer on a more personal level and for messenger to be the app of
everything.
What does it mean for brands: Messenger bots should be treated as a mobile site and the investment that requires. Bots are
still in the early stage, but by the end of 2018, bots, driven by the current favourable conditions, have the opportunity be an
integrated part of a brand’s social media activity for customer service and commerce.
2018 Impact level: 6

7. INSTAGRAM AS THE REAL INFLUENCER
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“Western civilization has become more dependent than ever on visual culture, visual artifacts, and visual communication as a mode of discourse and a means of developing a social and cultural identity.”
—National Education Association
The most visual of platforms- Instagram is engineering more audience engagement than other news feed platforms*.
As such a visual platform Instagram’s been a driving force in influencer partnerships and is well positioned to tap into the
potential ecommerce growth than most other platforms. 51% say Instagram influences their shopping habits the most
followed by Facebook 23% and Pinterest 22%.
No longer the preserve of just Gen Z/Millennials, Instagram is fast growing amongst older audiences: from Q1 2016 to Q1 2017
1.5m to total 3.2m for 35-44 year olds, 45-54 by 1m to total 2.1m and 55-64 by 475k to total 811k
Instagram is moving with the times, with video, stories and filters having all been added recently. Instagram is also
experimenting with a share button and spin-off messaging app for 2018 to ensure relevancy.
What does it mean for brands: The most influential of social platforms. Instagram was the platform in 2017, 2018 will only
strengthen its hold. It might not have the reach of others, but it has the biggest impact on shopping habits and engagement
(In the ongoing battle against audience apathy towards advertising) Instagram is just getting started, whilst other platforms
have reached maturation. Instagram’s influence on advertising budgets should be set to grow and grow.
2018 Impact level: 8

8. ALGORITHMS TO BE A HOT TOPIC. AGAIN
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Facebook is mooted in 2018 to be moving towards a news feed that’s only for friends, family and… ads. All other content will
be part of a separate Facebook Discover feed, including business pages. The impact on organic reach has been huge, where
it’s been trialled: “The change has seen users’ engagement with Facebook pages drop precipitously.... If replicated more
broadly, such a change would destroy many smaller publishers, as well as larger ones with an outsized reliance on social media
referrals for visitors” . The impact could be alarming for publishers like Buzzfeed reliant on Facebook as a distribution channel
and any brand still posting organically.
To date Instagram’s algorithm has gone under the radar, but if Instagram follow Facebook’s footsteps (which has often been
the case) we might also expect the Instagram algorithm to become more severe in 2018 and more noticeable as the network
grows in importance for marketers. Any change will be under the guise of penalising content that games the algorithm (like
Facebook) and to ensure people’s feed remains uncluttered- and of course brands will have to increase investment to reach
their desired audience.
What does it mean for brands: If Facebook’s news feed change happens it should finally kick into the long grass the concept of
organic posting, along with giving Facebook’s feed a much needed clean-up. The impact of any change to Instagram’s
algorithm has potential repercussions on brand posting tactics.
2018 Impact level: 9

9. INFLUENCER BACKLASH, MEH. INFLUENCERS
WILL INCREASE THEIR PROMINENCE
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What does it mean for brands: We will start to see more brands using influencers as a main creative component
of their ATL advertising output to hero their authenticity to the audience that they most want to reach. With
the extra investment, Influencer marketing will get smarter and have a greater layer of visibility of outcome.
2018 Impact level: 6
“…while you can give a piece of content to one global influencer with a million followers, the message is far more
authentic if you give it to 500 kids, each with 2,000 followers.”
– Florian Alt, Director global brand communications, Adidas
There’s been quite a bit of discussion that 2018 will be the year of the influencer backlash- brands will recognise
that these so called influencers are not the route to audience reach and authentic engagement that they had
been sold. However, while, declining audience interest and engagement might be the case for the first wave of
influencers, Jim Chapman and the like, there’s little sign that audience interest in influencers are slowing down.
Recent research found that nearly half of all millennials (48%) are now following an influencer, providing them
with a wanted content fix.
Brands like Coach and adidas are instead now co-opting influencers to form a central part of their advertising
campaigns- in adidas’ case this includes using micro influencers in their ATL campaigns. Influencers are becoming
the human face of a brand’s marketing messaging, a creative pillar and not just a vessel for product endorsement.
Yes, there are legitimate questions about impact, which platforms like Instagram are attempting to answer with
their paid partnership tag, giving brands the analytics that they need to help determine success. However, the
foundations behind the influencer explosion remain: adblocking and audience disinterest in advertising. While
these remain Influencers role in marketing communications will continue to gain prominence.

10. THE GROWING ROLE OF MESSENGER IN THE
SOCIAL MEDIA ADVERTISING MIX
10
The growth of Messenger- now the third most popular social platform in the UK behind Facebook and
YouTube- has not corresponded with the same importance attached to advertising on the channel. This
should change in 2018 as Facebook renew focus on presenting Messenger as a viable advertising platform
for brands, part of a strategy to further monetise their other platforms and solve current advertising
saturation on Facebook.
For brands advertising on Messenger presents a unique opportunity to interact with customers individually,
tailoring interactions to specific audience need-states. This one-to-one interaction fits with a wider
audience trend towards peer-to-peer messaging apps, as people opt for a more private experience than
most other more public social channels. With Instagram also experimenting with a spin-off messaging app,
Facebook are doubling down on this trend to ensure audience (and advertising) relevancy for years to
come.
What does it mean for brands: Messenger offers the appealing attraction of one-to-one conversation with
customers. The challenge is whether it will have the same appeal/impact as to when it forms part of
someone’s social media newsfeed, where the ad formats are richer to inspire and people are used to seeing
sponsored posts. Initial Messenger advertising might be more about brands highlighting their bot, or
platform as a customer service option to its audience, the fun should come if, or when, Instagram introduce
their messaging spin-off.
2018 Impact level: 6

11. THANK YOU
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