Top 10 Social Media Trends to Watch This Year

Social media has swiftly developed into a central hub for advertising your business or personal identity. A great approach to engaging with your audience is to embrace the latest trends. By doing this, you align your products with cultural movements that can spark customers’ interest in your brand. Explore the current popular patterns, styles, and formats of running social media profiles to hit the top positions on TikTok, Instagram, and beyond.

1. Short-Term Videos On Mobile Phones

One of the most popular social media now is TikTok. And it’s understandable why: free download, engaging content, and mobile-oriented interface. In fact, mobile users make up over 90% of the global digital population, making them a target audience for TikTok.

When it comes to videos, their length plays a vital role. In the digital world, the shorter they are, the more likely people will watch the whole thing, meaning fewer will drop off midway. As a result, short videos are a perfect format for creating content that’s easy to share on social media, allowing creators to deliver their message quickly. At the same time, users, especially younger users (Gen Alpha is the dominant user age group on TikTok) enjoy the content without spending too much time, which benefits both sides.

Video platforms often make changes to keep up with trends. For example, beginning October 15, 2024, YouTube is making its shorts longer.

Shorts can now be up to three minutes long. This isn’t a minor change—it’s a significant leap that boosts the creative potential of creators everywhere. 

With the extended time, YouTube encourages creators to craft more detailed stories and opens up new chances for audience interaction.

2. User-Generated Content

Social media marketers put a lot of effort into crafting stunning content and messages, but chances are potential customers just scroll right past it. Why? Because it’s not authentic, coming from the brand, and people know brands are biased.

Displaying user-generated content from UGC Creators helps create real interest and trust when promoting a brand. Some brands take it a step further by featuring UGC on their websites, giving visitors authentic, relatable content. 

Someone who’s actually used the product or service is going to seem way more trustworthy. They will most likely come across as more genuine since it’s not an obvious case of a paid partnership or sponsorship. The statistics say this approach boosts website conversions by nearly 29% compared to brands that don’t use it. To make it more successful, you should produce a competitor website audit to explore what they have and where they are. From that, you can create a plan for your brand.

3. Building a Loyal Community That Lasts

Community over follower count is a message we hear a lot on social media and for a good reason. And the numbers back it up: 66% of branded communities say they’ve seen a positive impact on customer retention.

What’s great about building a strong, engaged community is that this is where a brand’s most loyal, die-hard customers live. These are loyal fans, the ones who always show up, are the first to buy, and support a business no matter what.

4. Generative AI

Ever seen an ad and thought, “How do they know exactly what I want?” That’s generative AI (GenAI) and personalization in action. Ten years ago, it took hours to create ads, but now GenAI whips up digital ads in seconds, perfectly tailored to your audience. GenAI is especially powerful for running social media, offering the following benefits:

• Quickly generating posts, captions, and visuals;
• Crafting ads and messages that feel custom-made for users;
• Automating chats and replies with bots for instant interaction;
• Identifying new trends and popular hashtags to stay relevant;
• Adjusting campaigns in real-time for better results.

As you can see, it’s not just about time you get the job done; you get personal, generating custom content like taglines and captions that resonate with a targeted audience. So, generative AI is changing the game, with adoption rates soaring. In fact, by 2030, this market could hit $110.8 billion; by 2025, GenAI is expected to create 10% of all data.

5. Authenticity Beats Flashy Ads

Being as genuine as possible to your online audience is everything these days. People are more skeptical of marketing than ever before. What they really want is honest, trustworthy content, not glitzy ads full of photoshopped objects and other gimmicks.

When brands keep it real and share authentic stories, they connect on a deeper level with their audience. For instance, try showing the unpolished side of product creation or sharing customers reviews and testimonials.

Pro tip: when sharing user testimonials just remember that Gen Alpha users don’t like to read so if they’re your target group, only show testimonials that are short and sweet. You can also use the Ryviu review app to grab customer reviews faster and more effectively.

Being transparent and genuine also boosts credibility. The more honest a brand is, the more respect it earns, leading to stronger, lasting relationships with customers. Authenticity truly wins in the long run.

6. Entertainment Over Routine Promotion Tactic

We’re approaching a new trend where entertainment is becoming a significant element of branding. Companies that make efforts to create fun, engaging content on social media will grab attention, boost engagement, and eventually steal market share from those stuck in the same old routine.

The thing is that social media isn’t about speaking to people; it’s about really connecting with them. Thus, running social media is a two-way street where both sides exchange value. So, you may try the following tactics to achieve it:

• Let your audience guide content through polls and Q&As;
• Explore current news and trends, find relevant memes, and tailor them to your niche;
• Avoid hard selling and let customers come to you naturally for better results;
• Track engagement beyond social to align with broader business goals.

If your old, promotion-heavy approach is losing steam, it’s time to shift focus. Social media is really about building brand awareness, loyalty, and long-term relationships through content that entertains and engages.

7. Nano-Influencers Steal the Spotlight

Today’s savvy customers want to connect with brands and influencers that offer real substance, authenticity, and trust. Brands also need to watch out for fake influencers and avoid getting caught up in chasing meaningless interactions instead of building a powerful social media strategy. That’s why they started to prefer small bloggers with loyal and engaged audiences.

Nano-influencers, having from 100 to 10,000 followers, are getting recognized in social networking. Their comparatively small fan bases create a sense of closeness and trust that bigger social media personalities often can’t match.

In fact, HubSpot found that micro-influencers, who have a slightly larger following than nano-influencers, can drive up to 60% more engagement than tycoons. This shows how smaller creators are gaining serious traction in marketing strategies.

Moreover, it’s a no-brainer that partnerships with not-so-popular influencers tend to cost low. But don’t think such collaboration will come out ineffective; in fact, their audiences are very engaged and loyal. As brands look for budget-friendly, high-engagement strategies, nano-influencers are the perfect candidates in the marketing playbook, thanks to their authenticity and cost efficiency.

8. Social Commerce

A simple scroll can lead to the next purchase. People can buy products directly through social media sites like Instagram and Facebook. This activity blends social networking elements with online purchasing to allow users to explore and acquire goods without navigating away from the app. 

Besides browsing for updates from friends, users can now discover and instantly buy products. As you scroll through Instagram, you come across your favorite influencer presenting a pair of shoes. In just a few taps, you select your size and purchase without exiting the app. Indeed, experts predict the market to hit a global value of around $2.9 trillion by 2026.

9. Live Shopping

Live video is one of the most engaging ways to connect with your audience and showcase the authentic side of your brand. A new popular way of communicating with customers is livestream shopping, which resembles old-school TV shopping. In the live stream, customers get the chance to “bid” on items during the stream, which makes the whole experience more exciting.

This trend is booming in China thanks to mega influencers known as Key Opinion Leaders. They go live and promote products, while viewers can interact with them by commenting or calling in to ask for more details about the products. Moreover, to make the experience even more engaging, many live streams feature music and celebrity guests, making everything turn into an entire show.

10. On-Purpose Inconsistent Storytelling

This trend relates to a famous marketing tactic, FOMO (Fear of Missing Out), but in this case, it’s rather not so intense. Especially on TikTok, we’re seeing stories that start at the end, multiple plot lines unfolding simultaneously, and even entire communities making up fictional celebrities and wild narratives. This fresh approach gets viewers to pay closer attention and dive deeper to figure out what’s going on.

Storytelling is becoming less linear, and that’s exactly what makes it so engaging. Instead of the typical beginning, middle, and end structure, creators, including event photographers capturing dynamic moments, jump into the action mid-way, which acts as the perfect hook. Whether it’s dissecting a trending topic or dropping an unexpected twist, this style stops viewers in their tracks and gets them hooked. This trend opens up endless possibilities for brands and content creators as well.

Conclusion

Social media trends offer a snapshot of society’s current landscape. By integrating them into your marketing strategy, you show your audience that your brand recognizes and responds to their interests. Furthermore, monitoring these trends provides you with knowledge of recent innovations that advance your marketing strategies.

Of course, it takes time to pick suitable trends and tailor them to your company’s vision. After all, taking a step further to a relatable and relevant advertising campaign that connects with modern popular culture will yield growth in reach, engagement, and sales.