Social Media Corner: Analyzing Social Media Trends for 2013

By: Jessica Boles

2012 will go down in history as a significant year for social media. Facebook hit a billion users and went public, Instagram was bought out by Facebook, Twitter news feeds saw over 250 million tweets per day and Pinterest exploded. Here’s a look at the largest social media trends for 2013 set to unfold during this year.

Social Media Trend for the Upcoming Year

One of the biggest trends that we are starting to see is that social media will move beyond the marketing department. More enterprises will start to embrace social media tools for uses that go beyond the familiar marketing and community building. Marketers need to have bigger skill sets other than “PR”, “advertising” or “SEO”. All marketers will need to know all aspects of social media and other departments will start to make their own business plays as their audiences grow and demand better ways to work with one another.

Another trend to be seen in 2013 is the use of big data and how it will be more manageable. Companies now have access to unprecedented volumes of information about their customer base and trends. This year will see the emergence of new software and tools to manage this huge amount of data. This software will have the capability to track multiple social platforms in real time from tweets to Facebook likes and user comments. This is a critical tool to use so businesses will understand their customers beyond demographics and truly understand their behavior.

While the PC is still the most used device when it comes to social media, there has been a 63% increase of time spent on mobile devices for social media use. The growing trend looks like mobile devices are becoming the computing vehicle of choice. Businesses need to shift practices as their customers will reach for their mobile first for purchases and immediate information. When it comes to consuming social content, it’s all about mobile and mobile apps this year.

Whether its social media moving out of the marketing departments, use of big data and mobile apps, or  carving out your niche in the social media community, 2013 will be an exciting year as the social media game begins to change. 2013 is here!  So get in the game and capitalize on these trends for the upcoming year.