20 Key Social Media Software Trends & Predictions for 2024

As the world starts to recover and adjust to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, social media remains a stalwart presence in people’s lives. In fact, the highlight of current social media trends shows that the number of active social media users worldwide rose 9.9% from October 2020 to October 2021 (Hootsuite, 2021). This amounts to an addition of over 400 million users.

Moreover, social media has grown tremendously in usefulness in the past year. Aside from connecting users, social media is now seen as a news source and an influencer of purchasing decisions. As a result of the latter, business owners will be glad to learn that social media marketing and social commerce continue to show great potential and provide increased ROI. As such, the market for social media management software continues to grow as well.

In this article, we’ve listed some of the most important social media software trends for 2022. These social media software trends can help business owners map out more effective marketing strategies for the coming year.

Social media has never really come down from achieving its first highs in the early aughts when MySpace and YouTube achieved their first million users (Ospina, 2019). As such, many current social media trends are not really new. Instead, these long-lasting trends demonstrate how social media’s role in society and business continues to grow.

What’s new, however, are the challenges that business owners and marketers face in social media marketing. For instance, while marketers dealt with a decline in organic reach in 2019, social media marketing teams now find it difficult to determine the right platform for marketing their brand.

Business owners and marketing teams can hurdle these challenges by experimenting with newly popular social media platforms, such as TikTok. Moreover, top social media management systems can help businesses stay on top of marketing efforts across multiple platforms.

In addition, to help business owners and marketers prepare for the year ahead, we’ve listed down some major trends shaping social media. We’ve also included some relevant statistics to give you a more detailed picture of each trend.

1. Social Commerce Sales Continue to Climb

Social commerce has reshaped the way businesses sell products online, and this sales channel continued to rake in big bucks in 2021. Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest comprise some of the major platforms where users can browse and buy products.

Based on the numbers, social commerce shows no signs of slowing down. From $585 billion in 2021, worldwide revenue for this sales channel is expected to balloon to $3.4 trillion by 2028 (Statista, 2021a). The growth of social commerce in 2021, in particular, may be driven by the COVID-19 pandemic, which has forced many buyers to look for new ways of shopping for the products they need.

Demand for more shopping opportunities

In addition, Facebook continues to dominate as the platform where online shoppers are most likely to make a purchase. However, this doesn’t mean that marketers should focus solely on social selling through Facebook. After all, 72% of social media users agree that there should be more shopping opportunities on social media (WARC, 2021).

As a result, a multi-platform approach may provide the best ROI for social commerce. Surveys of online shoppers also revealed that deals and discounts would be the most effective means of convincing them to shop on social media more (Wunderman Thompson, 2021).

Despite the positive forecast for social commerce, though, many companies appear to be on the fence about this trend. A third of ecommerce companies are still evaluating whether they’ll start selling directly on social media in the coming years (SearchNode, 2021).

2. New Social Advertising and Marketing Strategies for Wiser Consumers

If you’re searching for social media trends this week, you probably read about the renewed importance of advertising in social media. Social media advertising continues to grow each year from $131 billion in 2020 to $154 billion in 2021 (Statista, 2021b). This means marketers are also willing to spend more on social media ads in the coming years.

Unsurprisingly, according to company data and data from Statista, Meta (Facebook) takes the lion’s share (70%) of the social media advertising market in the US. Similarly, marketers’ spending patterns indicate that businesses intend to maintain their investments in established social media platforms, such as Instagram, YouTube, and LinkedIn.

New Platforms for SMM

Interestingly, new platforms are taking the spotlight in terms of social media advertising and marketing strategies. For instance, 24% of marketers now consider TikTok to be effective at helping them reach business goals, compared to only 3% in 2020. Snapchat and Pinterest experienced the same growth in investment and perceived effectiveness (Hootsuite, 2021).

Various studies provide reasons behind the increased investment in these social media platforms. For instance, a study by Kantar found that 72% of respondents found TikTok ads inspiring. The same study revealed that users found TikTok ads more enjoyable, optimistic, and attention-grabbing compared to ads on other social media platforms (TikTok for Business, 2021).

These insights may prove to be valuable to businesses who want to stand out and increase engagement with audiences who are inundated with ads. To resonate with today’s wiser consumers and reach business goals, marketers must be willing to experiment with new advertising opportunities.

3. Influencers Are Here to Stay

Like other social media software trends from yesteryears, influencer marketing continues to be a crucial marketing strategy for many businesses. In fact, according to the most recent influencer marketing statistics, this channel’s market size has grown to $14 billion in 2021.

Plus, not only are there more influencers on social media today, but marketers are also planning to spend more on influencers. Influencer marketing spending is expected to increase through 2023, when spending will clock in at an estimated $5 billion (Insider Intelligence, 2021). In addition, Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook continue to be the leading platforms marketers choose for influencer marketing.

According to marketing experts, trends also indicate that more brands now work with a network of micro-influencers (with less than 20,000 followers). These influencers tend to be highly popular within a specific niche and come off as less scripted and more trustworthy (Forsey, 2020). As a result, they achieve higher engagement among customers.

Given these trends in influencer marketing, marketers must prioritize establishing partnerships with niche influencers that align with their business’ brand. Doing so also allows businesses to get maximum ROI from their influencer marketing efforts.

4. Social Media Improves Customer Service and Engagement

While using social media for customer service always seems to be among social media trends, the numbers say otherwise. According to Tien and Prodanovic (2021), over 70% of organizations don’t use social media for customer service or customer care.

However, the coming years may turn these numbers around. More brands are starting to realize the value of social media in delivering improved customer service. An increasing number of consumers also expect brands to respond quickly via social media, as well (Geyser, 2021). The combination of these two trends has resulted in the increased adoption of social media for customer service and may be driven by the pandemic, too. Through social media, companies can respond to customer requests and queries more quickly.

Aside from providing a means to deliver prompt customer service, social media also help brands boost engagement with customers. For instance, 70% of consumers feel more connected to a company whose CEO is active on social media (Sprout Social, n.d.). Moreover, the majority of consumers feel engaged when a brand’s employees share information about the business on social media.

Improved customer engagement is enough reason to start using social media to connect with customers. By keeping customers engaged, businesses can encourage brand loyalty.

5. AI and Chatbots Are Must-Haves

As we mentioned before, many companies and organizations have started to leverage social media to maintain open lines of communication with customers. However, more forward-thinking brands have taken this one step further. These brands incorporate artificial intelligence and chatbots into their social media channels.

According to chatbot use statistics, 40% of businesses in the US use pre-built chatbots. Through these chatbots, customer support teams are able to respond to customer queries in a more timely manner. Businesses can also use chatbots for sales and marketing.

Many businesses have adopted chatbots to be able to respond to customer queries 24/7. Moreover, the artificial intelligence and natural language processing behind chatbots allow these bots to handle full conversations most of the time (Bleu, 2021). Given these advanced features, businesses looking to make the most of social media marketing will also want to integrate chatbots into their social media strategies.

6. The Growth of TikTok

To say that the social networking platform TikTok has grown in the past year seems to be an understatement. Perhaps the numbers can better demonstrate how TikTok exploded into the social media scene in the past couple of years.

From 2019 to 2020, TikTok almost doubled its user base from 36 million to 66 million. This also translates into a global growth of 72%, excluding China (Global Web Index, 2020). Moreover, social media experts expect this growth to continue into 2024, when the platform is expected to have 89 million users.

Social media trends for business indicate that TikTok is now also the seventh most used social media platform in the world, with 689 million monthly active users globally. In addition, TikTok gained recognition as one of the most downloaded apps from Google Play and the Apple App Store in 2021 (Espósito, 2021).

TikTok’s audience tends to be at the younger end of the spectrum, with most users aged between 10 to 19. Perhaps this aligns with the app’s function of allowing users to share short lip-sync videos and complete video challenges. Moreover, the most popular video on TikTok in 2020 collected a total of 547.1 million views.

TikTok recently introduced advertorials into its platform, with ads seamlessly blending into the platform’s look and feel. Brands are expected to capitalize on this new feature, making TikTok a valuable addition to multi-platform marketing strategies.

7. Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube Remain Popular

Despite the growth of TikTok, however, marketers remain focused on tried-and-tested marketing channels for their organizations. These channels include social media giants Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube. For instance, Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram continue to rank as the most popular social networks in the world.

In addition, Facebook sits at the top with over 2.8 billion active users as of October 2021. This active usage penetration may also be the reason why most marketers consider Facebook highly effective for reaching business goals. Instagram and LinkedIn are likewise used by the majority of marketers today.

8. A Change in Social Media Marketing Goals

Social media trends also reveal marketers’ new goals for their social media marketing strategies. Marketers’ primary goals in 2021 involved advertising products and services and boosting revenue or sales. For 2022, however, marketers have chosen more customer-focused social media marketing goals.

For instance, according to research from Hubspot, marketers want to focus on expanding their target markets and increasing brand awareness in 2022. Coming into the new year, social media marketers also aim to improve relationships with customers and encourage brand loyalty (Forsey, 2020).

Most consumers have also shifted to online shopping during the pandemic. As a result, companies now want to reach new audiences while ensuring that current customers stay loyal.

9. Video Content Comes First

Similar to influencer marketing, video content remains a popular social media marketing strategy. The sudden popularity of a video-centric platform like TikTok also highlights the format’s ability to keep audiences engaged.

Moreover, a study by Cisco projected that video will account for as much as 82% of global Internet traffic by the end of 2021 (Cisco, n.d.). We don’t know for sure if the format has managed to achieve this feat, but what’s certain for social media trends 2022 holds is that companies must leverage video to stay ahead.

In addition, live videos appear to be gaining even more popularity. These videos create a sense of urgency and provide a more interactive, immersive environment. These factors can also prove to be useful to marketers looking to launch new products or convince viewers to make a purchase. As a result, we can expect marketers to keep video content in their social media marketing strategies in the coming years.

10. Short, “Snackable” Video Content Wins

In the previous years, we talked about ephemeral content gaining a foothold on online audiences. The coming years will see video content in a similar style—short, sweet, and easy to digest. Along with video content in general, short-form videos also became popular in 2021. Marketing experts similarly expect such videos to maintain their popularity in 2022 and beyond.

Studies have revealed that an average human’s attention span has fallen to 8 seconds in recent years (Stefanski, 2020). This may become even shorter as we struggle to keep up with information coming from everywhere, all the time. Again, we only have to look at TikTok’s success to see the effectiveness of short videos at capturing audiences’ attention.

As a result, it becomes even more important for marketers to deliver useful content in the quickest, shortest way possible. And, according to research, the majority of marketers who currently use short-form video also plan to spend more on the format next year (Bretous, 2021).

11. The Integration of Social Media and Augmented Reality

We now see deeper integrations of augmented reality (AR) within social media, in addition to advanced technologies like chatbots and artificial intelligence. Through AR, consumers can test products before making a purchase.

For instance, one social media platform that has integrated AR technology is Snapchat. Through Snap AR, users can create Lenses or artistic or visual effects that can be applied to real-time camera feeds. Moreover, according to Snap AR, over 200,000 Lens creators have contributed over 2 million Lenses to the platform’s community. Similar technology can also be found on Instagram filters.

In the future, we may see more brands experimenting with Instagram filters and Snapchat Lenses to improve engagement with their social media followers.

12. The Increasing Use of Social Audio

As brands aim to tap into new audiences and build more tightly-knit communities, marketers explore new content formats. One such channel that we may see more of in the future is social audio.

Social media platforms have adjusted to accommodate the sudden rise of audio content, as well. For instance, earlier this year, Twitter rolled out its “Spaces” feature. Through this feature, Twitter users can discover audio rooms in progress. Similarly, Facebook has made it possible for public figures and creators to create live audio rooms.

The previous year also saw the rise of Clubhouse, an audio-based social application. Through Clubhouse, users can create and join different audio chat rooms, each of which can host thousands of people. From January to February 2021 alone, the platform’s user base had also grown from 2 million weekly active users to 10 million weekly active users.

Most Popular Social Media Management Software

1. TweetDeck is the most powerful Twitter tool for real-time tracking, organizing, and engagement. Learn more when you read our full review.
2. Sprout Social is a social media interaction software that lets your organization communicate and build trust with your audience. Discover its capabilities when you check out our thoughts on the
   solution.
3. Agorapulse is a social community and moderation manager that can act as a hub for all your social networking profiles.
4. Sendible can schedule messages, engage your audiences, and measure ROI right from one, easy-to-use dashboard.
5. Salesforce Social Studio is a social media solution that leads you to business growth opportunities in this channel.

13. User-Generated Content Remains Valuable

Another continuing trend from previous years is the prevalence of user-generated content in social media marketing. Published by real users of products, user-generated content typically comes off as more authentic and more trustworthy. This is also probably why nearly 80% of consumers say that user-generated content significantly influences their buying decisions (Stackla, 2021).

In the coming years, companies will likely continue to rely on user-generated content to add authenticity to their brand.

Similarly, more marketers will explore partnerships with creators. Creators are entrepreneurs who write or design content to publish on social media. Many of these creators are regular social media users who have found a way to monetize their hobbies during the pandemic. According to Tien and Prodanovic (2021), 50 million people call themselves creators on social media as of 2021.

Similar to influencers, content creators currently stand to make a lot of money. For instance, the creator market is reportedly currently valued at $20 billion and creators can potentially make millions more in advertising and sponsorships (Shaw, 2021). As a result, marketing experts expect businesses to tap into the creator economy to boost customer engagement and support community-building efforts.

14. The Use of Social Media to Master Community Management

This year, many marketers laid the groundwork for building online communities and fostering brand loyalty. However, building communities of brand advocates is often easier said than done. This is especially true for SMBs that don’t have the resources of global brands.

According to Hootsuite’s Social Trends 2022 report, the secret to successful community management lies in tapping into pre-existing communities. In the coming years, more marketers will realize this. More marketers will also find online circles that align with their niche and brand and form connections with these communities. This is considerably easier than building a following from the ground up.

In most cases, tapping into existing communities means partnering with creators who have already built their own niche following. Investing in creators will also provide businesses with valuable insights into their target customers while removing the burden of constant content creation.

15. Social Listening Becomes Key to SMM

In addition to the trends above, social listening has become an important tracking strategy for many social media marketers. Marketing experts expect this strategy to be more common among brands in the coming years.

Social listening refers to the act of tracking social media networks to find conversations about your brand and products. You can also watch for mentions of keywords and competitors. Once you collect data on these mentions and conversations, you can analyze them and gain valuable insights. These insights can also help you improve customer service levels or refine your next marketing campaign.

In most cases, marketers use social listening to measure and understand the impact of their campaigns on their target audience. The good news is that there are various social listening tools that make it easier to find mentions and conversations relevant to your brand.

16. Social ROI Becomes Easy to Measure

Social media marketers have finally gotten the hang of measuring the impact of social media marketing on business outcomes. This knowledge may be driven by the fact that this year, businesses leaned on social media more than ever. Sales, service requests, customer queries—all these were done on various social media platforms in 2021.

As a result, many marketers have figured out how to quantify the results of their SMM efforts. In fact, one study also revealed that more than 83% of marketers have become confident in their organizations’ ability to accurately measure their social media ROI (Hootsuite, 2021b).

The Hootsuite survey goes on to reveal more interesting insights. For instance, organizations that can easily quantify their social media ROI focus on the holistic impact of social media on their marketing strategies. This may also be a good practice to adopt if you’re still trying to figure out how to measure the results of your SMM efforts.

17. The Use of Social Media as a News Source

Social media has evolved to become more useful in recent years. For instance, many social media users turn to these platforms to keep themselves updated on news and current events. This only seems natural as more traditional news sources adapt to modern technology and start getting on social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter.

According to a survey by Pew Research Center, specifically, 48% of American adults get news from social media at least sometimes (Walker & Matsa, 2021). Moreover, the survey indicates that a third of Americans rely on Facebook for news. The numbers are similarly high for Twitter, with 55% of Twitter users regularly getting news from the platform.

Interestingly, Gen Z (43%) and millennial (43%) users rely the most on social media as a news source.

18. Increased Demand for Accountability in Social Media

As social media continues to be used as a news source, these platforms have come under heavy scrutiny for being vehicles of fake news. Specifically, 56% of journalists believe that social media plays a central role in the proliferation of fake news (Seidenberg, 2021). This is especially true when social media platforms, such as Facebook turn into an echo chamber.

The double-edged sword of sourcing news from social media has never been more apparent than during the COVID-19 pandemic. Various surveys and studies have explored news coverage and news consumption of the pandemic on different platforms. For instance, the Edelman Trust Barometer 2020 Report found that 54% of adults aged 18 to 34 relied on social media for news on COVID-19 (Edelman, 2020).

These surveys also indicate an increased demand for accountability in social media. According to a National Tracking Poll by Morning Consult, 79% of American adults also believe that fake accounts and pages that spread misinformation about COVID-19 should be removed from social media platforms. Similarly, according to the poll’s results, 68% of American adults believe that social media users who share fake news should at least be suspended or banned from the platform.

In the coming years, we may also see how social media companies act upon such insights on their role in fighting or spreading misinformation.

19. The Beginnings of Social Media Regulation

In connection to the trend of accountability on social media, the previous year gave the American public a taste of what social media platforms would look like under scrutiny from the federal government.

In October 2021, former Facebook product manager Frances Haugen took the stand at Capitol Hill. At a hearing in the US Senate, Haugen provided testimony on various issues about Facebook, including the company’s inability to effectively curtail vaccine misinformation on the platform (Slotnik, 2021).

Haugen also released what is now called the Facebook Papers, which reveal the company’s internal research on the negative impact of its platform on misinformation. Aside from vaccine misinformation, these papers also provide details of the company’s awareness of Instagram’s effects on body image issues among teenagers (Wells et al., 2021). The full implications of the research exposed by the Facebook Papers remain to be seen, however.

Even before the Facebook Papers were released, however, the White House had also become vocal about holding social media companies accountable for information that appears on their platforms. For instance, according to White House Communications Director Kate Bedingfield, the administration is likewise currently reviewing policies on holding social media platforms legally accountable for publishing misinformation (Klein, 2021).

20. Using Social Media to Display Social Responsibility

Lastly, according to recent research, consumers now expect brands to take a stand on social issues and to do so publicly. Specifically, consumers want brands to display support for social causes on social media (O’Brien, 2021).

Consumers now seek out brands that show awareness of social issues and demonstrate social responsibility. Millennials and Gen Z consumers, in particular, find it important for companies to speak out on issues such as climate change, racism, police brutality, and inequality (Christie, 2020). These increased expectations may be driven by heightened awareness of social issues among consumers.

To benefit from this trend, marketers would do well to boost their following among Gen Z and millennial consumers. Brands with an established audience will also want to use their social media reach to spread awareness of a cause they support. This can add to a brand’s authenticity and improve trust among customers.

Interesting Social Responsibility Statistics for Brands:

• 54% of consumers think brands should actively participate in conversations about social issues such as sexual abuse and racial injustice (Christie, 2020).
• 50% of consumers also do research on a brand’s stance on social issues (Komiya, 2020).
• Moreover, 53% of consumers will pay more for brands that take a public stand on politics, the economy, and public health (Kelly, 2021).

Leveraging Social Media Trends to Your Advantage

These current social media trends make for a long list, but there are some common threads running through them. For instance, in the coming year, brands choose to focus on expanding their audience and strengthening customer loyalty. Furthermore, many marketers plan to achieve this by tapping into creator networks and leveraging user-generated content.

Many businesses also plan to increase their investment in newly popular social media platforms, such as TikTok and Clubhouse. These platforms allow marketers to explore new content formats like short-form video and audio while maintaining campaigns on tried-and-tested channels like Facebook and Instagram.

If you’re refining your strategies for measuring the ROI of social media, you can also check out our list of top social listening tools for any business. In this way, you won’t miss out on relevant customer insights on your products and campaigns.

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By Nestor Gilbert

Nestor Gilbert is a senior B2B and SaaS analyst and a core contributor at FinancesOnline for over 5 years. With his experience in software development and extensive knowledge of SaaS management, he writes mostly about emerging B2B technologies and their impact on the current business landscape. However, he also provides in-depth reviews on a wide range of software solutions to help businesses find suitable options for them. Through his work, he aims to help companies develop a more tech-forward approach to their operations and overcome their SaaS-related challenges.