State of Social Media Marketing in 2024 [7 Trends]

Are you looking to refresh your social media campaign this year? By looking at the state of social media marketing in 2024, you’ll see what’s trending and how you can integrate those trends into your social strategy. On this page, we’ll provide you with seven social media marketing trends for 2024 that’ll push your company ahead of the pack.

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1. Authentic content

One of the biggest social media marketing trends for 2024 is authentic content. People don’t want to see boring stock photos and scripted content. They want to hear from real people and get content that feels like it’s coming from another person rather than a company.

People want to make personal connections with your business. It’s harder for them to relate to your company if you build the persona of a stiff or uptight corporation. If people can’t connect with your business, they lose the motivation to interact and buy from your brand.

So, how do you create authentic content? User-generated content (UGC) is the key to creating authentic content. This kind of content focuses on photos, videos, and testimonials from people who use your products or services and want to share their experiences.

When you post user-generated content, you present your audience with first-hand experiences of what it’s like to use your products or work with your company. People take more interest in this content because they can see a genuine experience. Target utilizes user-generated content, for example, to highlight their products and make connections with their audience.

In this example, Target uses a user’s picture of their dog wrapped up in one of the company’s blankets with the caption, “What I’m doing when I say I’m busy.”

This photo and caption resonate with their audience. Many of Target’s followers love dogs — as demonstrated by the comments — and find the photo cute and relate to the caption. It’s a great use of user-generated content to encourage engagement and subliminally advertise their products.

Target even made the image shoppable, so if users liked the blanket, they could find it on their website and buy it!

With user-generated content, you’ll make your brand more relatable and build connections with your audience.

2. Video content

As you look at the state of social media marketing in 2024, you’ll notice that video is continuing to dominate. If you want to drive success with your campaign, video is the future of social media in 2024 and beyond. With platforms like TikTok exploding in popularity and Facebook adding a “Facebook Watch” section, you can see that social media platforms are moving more towards emphasizing video content.

Videos grab your audience’s attention and get them to engage with your content. Just look at these stats, which show the impact of video marketing:

• 86% is the amount your conversions improve with video marketing
• 92% of users share videos with other people
• 139% is the amount your brand association increases after someone watches your video
• 90% of people say videos help them decide on a purchase

Video marketing has a significant impact on building brand recognition, reaching leads, and earning conversions. If you want to drive success with your social media campaign, you need to take advantage of one of the most impactful social media marketing trends of 2024. Take advantage of video by creating videos for your social profiles.

You can create videos that highlight customers using your products, explanation videos on how you use your products, whiteboard videos on how your products work, and more. By investing in video, you’ll help create a better social media profile for your business.

3. Private and meaningful connections

One of the most important social media marketing trends for 2024 is creating private and meaningful relationships. People are looking for personal connections with companies to help build their trust and confidence in those businesses.

The best way to build these private and meaningful connections is through messaging.

Every social media platform offers messaging, but not every business pays attention to the messages they get. If you want to stay on top of social media trends, start paying attention to your inbox.

Messaging is a valuable way to connect with leads, answer their questions, and provide relevant information. In fact, 69% of people believe that the ability to message a business makes them feel more confident about that brand. This private connection helps people get to know your company better.

If you can’t keep up with your messages, you can use chatbots to help provide users with answers to simple questions and focus your time on solving more complex problems.

4. Social shopping

When you look at the state of social media marketing in 2024, you’ll find that social shopping is on the rise. Social shopping is a critical component of your social media campaign because it encourages people to purchase your products when they see them on your social posts. Users want to have access to brands and products through social media.

Social shopping allows users to focus on specific products you offer, rather than visiting your site and trying to find what they need. Many companies will use social shopping through ads. They can deliver tailored ad content that focuses on products that fit your interests best.

Here’s an example of a social shopping post from a company that creates yoga-style dress pants.

If a user is interested, they can click the “Learn More” call to action and visit a page where they can buy the pants from the ad. It’s simple, easy, and effective for earning conversions. Some social media platforms will allow you to create shoppable organic posts, too.

Instagram, for example, allows you to add tags for products featured in your photo. You can see an example of this in Target’s Instagram post.

In this post, each item in the photo has a tag with the name of the product and the price. You can click on the tag for the specific product and visit that product on Target’s website.

If you decide to hop on this social media trend for 2024, make sure you don’t take people off their social media platform when shopping with your business. Users should be able to easily visit your website and buy the product, all while in the app. If you take them out of the social media app or direct them away from it, they’ll be more likely to leave and go back to their social app.

If you want to keep up with the future of social media in 2024, integrate social shopping into your social media plan.

5. Micro-influencers

When you work on your social media strategy, you may reach out to influencers to help you reach more people interested in your business. While many companies will reach out to more prominent influencers, you don’t need to partner with a big name to have an impact. As you’ll see by the state of social media marketing in 2024, micro-influencers are the best way for you to reach interested leads.

Micro-influencers are people who have a small but steady following. These are people that cater to a specific niche. Even though it’s a small audience, it’s a dedicated one that’s interested in the niche you want to reach.

With micro-influencers, you have a greater level of personalization because you’re targeting such a specific niche.

So, how do you find micro-influencers?

You can start by searching branded hashtags and related keywords in hashtags to find who’s posting about your products or similar products. You can check out their profile and see what kind of content they post, who engages with it, and more. By partnering with micro-influencers, you’ll help your brand reach more interested leads.

6. Short-lived content

Looking at the state of social media marketing in 2024, you’ll find that short-lived content, also known as ephemeral content, is making its way to the top of the priority list. This content only lasts for a specified period. Snapchat is a prime example of a platform that uses short-lived content.

Sent photos and videos only last as long as the user sets the message to last or until the receiver closes the message. For Snapchat Stories, the pictures and videos remain online for 24 hours before disappearing. Other platforms, like Facebook and Instagram, have added “Stories” to allow people to post photos and videos that last for 24 hours.

As more social media platforms create opportunities for short-lived content, you need to take advantage of this opportunity to reach and engage your audience.

This type of content catches an audience’s attention and gets them to interact with your business. Whether you’re adding to your own story or running ads between people’s stories, you have an opportunity to create exciting and engaging content.

By investing time in short-lived content, you’ll garner more engagement on social media.

7. Creativity

You may be surprised to see that creativity is part of the future of social media in 2024 because it seems obvious. The reality, however, is that some companies don’t put the time and effort into making their content genuinely creative. If you want to stand out from the competition, you need to get creative with your social media content.

It isn’t enough to toss a photo up on your Twitter profile and put a caption. You need to do more to help your business stand out in a user’s newsfeed and get them to engage with your content. Creativity will depend on your industry and audience.

For some companies, bright photos and catchy captions will get their audience to engage. For other businesses, well-edited videos and intricate infographics will work better. Chewy is a prime example of creating unique content.

This company took a creative approach to market its playlist on Spotify.

They posted a photo of a dog with headphones, which immediately catches people’s interest. Then followed up by captioning the photo with a fun fact about dogs and music, then shared they have a playlist to help keep dogs calm when they’re left home alone. It’s unique, eye-catching, and interesting.

This Instagram post is an excellent example of getting creative and engaging your audience. When you create social media content, make it creative, but also professional and high-quality. It should always reflect your brand so that people get familiar with your business.

Stay on top of the future of social media in 2024

As you continue to develop your social media strategy in 2024, you must take note of upcoming trends.

You’ll want to use these trends in your social media plan so you can stay at the top of your game. If you’re overwhelmed with trying to keep up with your social media strategy up to speed, our team of over 500 social-savvy experts can help. With over a decade of experience, we’ll help you create the right content for your social media platforms.

Contact us online or call us today at 888-601-5359 to speak with a strategist about our social media plans.