—–Social Media Trends—–
- What are Social Media Trends?
Social media trends refer to the popular and emerging topics, themes, behaviors, and content styles that gain significant attention and engagement on social media platforms. These trends can manifest in various forms, including hashtags, challenges, viral videos, memes, and more. They are often short-lived and can vary across different social media platforms. - Why Are Social Media Trends Important?
Understanding and leveraging social media trends is crucial for several reasons:
Relevance: Following trends helps individuals and businesses stay relevant in the rapidly evolving landscape of social media. It shows that you are in touch with current events and popular culture, which can make your content more relatable to your target audience.
Engagement: Trend-related content tends to generate higher engagement because it aligns with what’s currently capturing the public’s attention. This can lead to more likes, shares, comments, and overall interaction with your posts.
Visibility: Posts related to trending topics are more likely to appear in users’ feeds and search results, as social media algorithms often prioritize trending content. This increased visibility can help you reach a broader audience.
Brand Personality: Participating in relevant trends can showcase your brand’s personality and creativity. It allows you to inject a sense of timeliness and humor into your content, making your brand more relatable and approachable.
- How to Identify and Utilize Social Media Trends:
Monitor Trending Topics: Keep an eye on the trending sections of social media platforms, which often highlight popular hashtags and discussions.
Use Trending Hashtags: Incorporate trending hashtags into your posts when relevant. However, ensure that the connection to your content is genuine and not forced.
Create Trend-Related Content: If a trend aligns with your brand’s message or products, consider creating content that participates in or capitalizes on the trend. This could be through challenges, memes, or creative reinterpretations.
Stay Authentic: While it’s essential to embrace trends, ensure that your content remains authentic and aligns with your brand’s values and identity. Don’t chase trends blindly if they don’t fit your brand’s image.
Engage with Trending Content: Join discussions related to trending topics by commenting, sharing, or participating in conversations. This can increase your visibility within those trending discussions.
- The Evolving Nature of Trends:
Social media trends are dynamic and can change rapidly. What’s trending today may not be relevant tomorrow. Therefore, it’s important to stay agile and adaptable in your approach to trends. Continuously monitor social media platforms, and be prepared to pivot your content strategy when new trends emerge.
Social media trends are a dynamic and influential aspect of online communication. Understanding and effectively utilizing these trends can help you stay relevant, boost engagement, increase visibility, and enhance your brand’s presence on social media platforms. However, it’s essential to do so in a way that aligns with your brand’s identity and values.
More Links:
https://www.mediatoolkit.com/blog/social-media-trends/
https://sproutsocial.com/insights/social-media-trends/
—–Social Media Algorithms—–
- What Are Social Media Algorithms?
Social media algorithms are complex sets of rules and calculations used by social media platforms to determine the content that users see in their feeds, search results, and notifications. These algorithms are designed to personalize and prioritize content based on each user’s interests, behavior, and engagement patterns. - Why Are Social Media Algorithms Important?
Understanding social media algorithms is crucial for several reasons:
Content Relevance: Algorithms aim to show users content that is most relevant and engaging to them. This personalized approach helps users discover content they are likely to enjoy.
User Experience: Social media platforms want to provide a positive user experience. Algorithms help filter out low-quality or irrelevant content, reducing information overload and spam.
Content Visibility: For content creators and businesses, algorithms determine how widely their content is distributed. Understanding these algorithms is essential for maximizing the reach of your content.
Engagement and Interaction: Algorithms prioritize content that encourages user engagement, such as likes, comments, shares, and clicks. Knowing how to create content that resonates with your audience can boost your visibility.
- How Social Media Algorithms Work:
User Data Collection: Algorithms collect extensive data about users, including their interactions, interests, demographics, and past behavior on the platform.
Content Scoring: Each piece of content is assigned a score based on factors like relevance, engagement, recency, and user history. The content with the highest scores is prioritized.
Personalization: Algorithms tailor users’ feeds based on their individual preferences and behavior. This means that two users may see different content even if they follow the same accounts.
Recency: Many algorithms consider the freshness of content, giving priority to newer posts. However, this can vary between platforms.
Engagement Signals: Content that receives more likes, comments, shares, and other interactions is more likely to be shown to a wider audience.
Content Type: Some algorithms prioritize certain types of content, such as video or live streams, to encourage diverse content creation.
- How to Optimize for Social Media Algorithms:
Quality Content: Create high-quality, engaging content that resonates with your target audience. Encourage interactions through thoughtful captions and call-to-actions.
Consistency: Post regularly to maintain a presence in users’ feeds and stay relevant.
Engage with Followers: Respond to comments and engage with your audience. Interaction signals to algorithms that your content is valuable.
Use Analytics: Monitor analytics to understand what types of content perform best and adjust your strategy accordingly.
Ad Campaigns: Consider using paid advertising to boost the visibility of your content, especially if you’re looking to reach a broader audience.
Stay Informed: Keep up with platform updates and changes to algorithms. Platforms often provide guidelines and insights for content creators.
- The Challenges of Social Media Algorithms:
Filter Bubbles: Algorithms can create filter bubbles, where users are exposed only to content that aligns with their existing beliefs and interests, limiting diverse perspectives.
Algorithm Changes: Social media platforms frequently update their algorithms, which can disrupt content strategies. Staying adaptable is key.
Algorithmic Bias: Algorithms may inadvertently amplify bias and discrimination, leading to issues of fairness and representation.
Social media algorithms are the driving force behind what users see on their feeds, and understanding how they work is essential for content creators and businesses. Optimizing for algorithms involves creating engaging, high-quality content and staying informed about platform changes to maintain visibility and engagement with your target audience.
More Links:
https://sproutsocial.com/insights/social-media-algorithms/
—–Planning for Campaign Content Execution—–
If we were going to run a live campaign, this is where the second half of our planning sheet would really start helping us… Let’s take a look ahead to see if there is anything else we should be keeping in mind while planning our campaigns & content.
Reviewing Second Half of Our Social Media Strategic Plan Sheet:
https://share.getcloudapp.com/P8u5pJKX
Execute – Implement – Launch
- Check For Message Clarity And Uniformity Across Platforms
- Graphic Uniformity
- Conversation Monitoring
- Social ID’s Added To All Branding Including Email And Print Media
- Daily Posting Where Applicable
- Reporting Plan: Engagement, Influence, Numbers, etc.
Measure – Metrics – Track
Weekly Status Updates
- Number / Network Growth
- Status: Engagement
- Status: Influence
- What’s Working? What Isn’t? Evaluation And Revisions
Goal Assessment – Revised Goals – New Goals
- Linked-in
- Youtube
- Snapchat
Discussion 3 – Local Product Ads
*Submit Discussion into D2L
Find 2 existing ads for any local products that are sold by a company here in the state, and rewrite all the wording & headlines… Same photo or video content, just different copy to go along with it…
Assignment 3A – Create All Content Including Ads
*Submit Assignment into D2L
Now that we’ve put some great thought into our campaigns, and getting organized with our new content ideas, we should have a pretty clear path to all the individual pieces of content we’ll need to create… Let’s start getting through as many pieces of content as possible for this campaign.
At minimum, you should be creating the following:
1 spoken audio recording with or without video (similar to our podcast recording, how can you also produce an audio-based piece of content that is related to your brand? maybe an educational piece teaching someone something about the brand or industry? maybe it even relates to your blog post?)
2-4 blog posts total (You should already have one, these can also cross over and help drive some of your content pieces as well)
2-4 new photo or video ad ideas to promote the brand (each of these should also have a slightly different alternative A/B version we could use for testing engagement). Use an Ad Mock Up tool to present it as it would appear on a platform, such as https://admockups.com
Feel free to add in as much extra content as you’d like, including anything from the past that you may have already created.
When finished, submit here into D2L!
Curious what other students have submitted in past semesters?
Take a look at some sample student work from the past:
https://share.zight.com/YEuzwGWW
Let’s add your work into this folder as well! Reach out if you have any questions!
Assignment 3B – Create a Minimum of One Social Media Account
By now you should know which platforms fit best for your brand… For this assignment, you will create one demo social media account for your brand… Some of us may want to do this and continue using it in the future, and some of us may not want to continue using this account after the class. Feel free to title this account with “Demo” if this is the case. Along with creating the account, you will want to do the following:
- Upload profile photo
- Upload cover photo if necessary
- Upload a minimum of 6 pieces of content that will make your account look more complete
- Submit a screenshot of your new account into D2L
Look forward to sharing and also seeing others and their accounts!
Sample Student Work
