In 2010, Facebook become the predominant social media site with over 500 million users globally. In the U.S., the site has attracted an increasingly mainstream population (particularly women under age 55). This is why major national brands began setting up pages in hopes of connecting with their customers.
While big money Facebook campaigns will abound in 2011, (see Corona Light's Times Square promotion for an example); a number of local businesses are using Facebook effectively at low cost.
The Kinsale Inn in Mattapoisett has over a thousand followers on their page for example, and First Citizens Credit Union in Fairhaven offers a constant stream of new content to engage visitors. It's clear that Facebook will continue to be the dominant player in 2011, and therefore should be the first site businesses focus on when considering social media.
The changes Facebook announced on 60 Minutes – most importantly placement of user photos and location prominently on the profile page – are indicative of two larger social media trends we'll see in 2011.
The first trend is that the Internet and social media are becoming more visually driven, with an emphasis on photos and videos. A whitepaper published by Cisco in June estimates that video will account for 57 percent of all traffic on the web by 2014. YouTube is already the second most popular search engine after Google, and video often gets higher placement on Yahoo and Bing's search engine results. In addition, web users tend to click on a video instead of reading text when visiting a site.
The second trend is being driven by the rapid adoption of smart phones. High sales of the iPhone and Droid are resulting in a plethora of new location-dependent applications. If you purchase a Droid for example, you'll immediately notice that many of the applications use a GPS signal. The focus on location is growing quickly because developers see it as way to monetize social media.
Facebook uses the data to offer locally targeted ads of interest, and sites such as Foursquare, use it to send ‘real time' messages to nearby phones. For example, when you walk by a bakery Foursquare will push an ad for “Fresh blueberry muffins!” onto your phone's screen. We'll likely see new forms of locally focused advertising emerge in 2011, particularly aimed at small businesses.
The next step in mobile technology will be to use your phone as a wallet. Instead of pulling out your debit card, you will simply wave your phone over a sensor at the cash register. This technology is already in use overseas, and variations are in development for the U.S. market (PayPal is desperately trying to own this space).
Mobile web use may also increase once the new “tablet” computers, such as the iPad, gain real market share. A long-time industry leader, Barry Diller, chairman of IAC/InterActiveCorp, (which owns a host of successful e-commerce sites), stated that he believes “tablet” computers will replace laptops, the way laptops replaced desktops a decade ago.
The move to true mobile computing, which is poised to take off in 2011, will change how we use the Internet, interact on social media sites, and market to customers on-line. Social media platforms will no longer be something we “access” intermittently but will always be “on” and available everywhere. It will become how we communicate throughout the day (much the way we use e-mail and phones today). Once that ubiquity becomes mainstream (its currently limited to younger users and early adopters) businesses will find it impossible not to engage customers on social media. We should think of the sites we're using today as early stage prototypes. These platforms will either rapidly evolve or be overtaken by much more sophisticated platforms yet to emerge. 2011 promises to be a seminal year in social media technology. Stay tuned!
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