social media trends in 2020

With an increase in technological advancement comes an abundance of people spending mass amounts of time online, specifically on social media. There are more than 1.6 BILLION active users on Facebook and more than 500 MILLION users on Instagram each day. For these reasons alone, it is so crucial to have your business page represented on social media.

Ensuring your business page comes to life on Facebook and Instagram can provide a way to increase both your reach and engagement with new and existing fans. If you don’t, you may be losing out on potential customers. For some people, finding you on social media may be their only interaction with your business before deciding whether or not to purchase your product or service. That being said, take a look below at these 3 easy tips to ensure you are getting the most out of social media.

3 Tips and Tricks for Retailers to Utilize This Year

Humanized Content: 👫 Small businesses have a higher engagement rate when posting pictures of people, such as employees. When you post content of your employees, it allows your fans to familiarize themselves with you and your business. When they walk in your store, they’ll recognize you/them from social media. This tactic helps the customer build both trust and a positive relationship with your business before ever walking through the door. Simple as that. Pictures of you/your employees modeling your products is a way to take positive community engagement online, into the store.
Regularly update Facebook & Instagram: 📍 Finding your business on these platforms may be a customer’s only interaction with you before deciding to come in. It’s important that your information is updated regularly. Posting new products and deals can drive fan excitement and, even better, them into the store. I recommend posting 3-5x a week on each of these platforms to increase your engagement and following. Believe it or not, by updating your social platforms regularly, you could actually rank higher in search results.
Brand consistency across all platforms: ✅ It’s important to have brand consistency across all your digital platforms so your customers can clearly identify you. I suggest incorporating things like the same profile picture, fonts, color identity, etc. on all sites. Make sure your brand has an aligned message across all social platforms (including your website) so that customers aren’t confused!

Now that you have a sense of direction about utilizing social media for your business, it’s time to start implementing it! Be creative and have fun with it! Let’s make 2020 the best year that your business has ever seen!

Share a comment about which tip helped most or an area where you struggle. I’d love to hear from you!

Bryce

Welcome to the first Crystal Media blog of 2020! I’m actually writing this during our winter break because I wanted to wait until the last minute to get the feedback from the team. We all collaborated for you this week on what’s still working in 2020. Keep reading to see if you discover a few themes.

“I think we’re going to see the use of Instagram Stories continue to grow. With Instagram adding fun Stickers, Filters and more, the IG user is not only posting Stories, but they’re also watching. In fact, 500 million people use Stories every day. Stories are a great way to stay top of mind daily. If you’re new to Stories, don’t overthink it! It seriously takes a minute or less to post. Just be you, relate to your audience, and be consistent. As you keep posting, you’ll start picking up what’s performing well and what your audience wants to see.” – Crystal, Founder of Crystal Media and Retail Social Media Expert

“Humanized content and behind the scenes will continue to capture your audience and grow your brand in 2020. People buy from people and it’s a HUGE advantage small businesses have over the big box. Don’t shy away from sharing your story, what makes you unique, your funny quirks, passions, and interest. Sharing behind the scenes videos of you and the team will help potential customers get to know you. If you’re stuck one simple tip is to talk to the camera like you would talk to a customer in your store, it doesn’t have to be perfect but it does have to be real.” – Pauline, Director of Operations and Retail Social Media Mentor

“Authenticity is going to be key when creating content for Instagram. Consumers want to get to know the face behind the business, so don’t be afraid to tell your story whether that be through video in Stories or a long-form written caption. The more connected your customer feels to your brand/business the more likely they’ll share your content with others on their own accounts.” – Erika, Marketing Coordinator

“Video! Using videos as ads, especially Video View ads as an objective continues to be the most engaging and cost-efficient content. Take it one step further and go Live on Facebook and then turn that into an ad.” – Jess, Facebook and Instagram Ads Manager

“Videos are definitely still working today, as they are engaging and memorable: Your message is more likely to stick! Posting interactive humanized content or sharing user-generated content are also great tools. You want your viewers to be engaged and feel included!” – Maddie, Facebook and Instagram Ads Manager

There you have it, without knowing it all 5 of us predicted very similar trends to continue in 2020. Are you taking advantage of video? Facebook ads? Instagram Stories? Humanized and authentic content? If not be sure to add it to your plan and leave a comment with how you’ll use these tips in 2020.