2024 Marketing Trends: 10 Predictions for Social Marketers

"If you’re not getting the Facebook ad performance you want, it’s because you’re not moderating your comments. Can’t believe so many brands are still missing this.” - Moiz Ali. Founder of Native, 2023. Listen to his podcast here.

Spam, extreme profanity, and discriminatory comments are the top universally harmful content categories from 2023. This type of content stifles meaningful interactions among users. Hate speech visible on your posts can damage your brand reputation and negatively impact your ad performance. That's why moderating comments is a non-optional task in your marketing efforts.

54% of social media users use social media to research products and 71% are more likely to purchase products and services based on social media referrals. (GlobalWebIndex)

 

2. Closer Collaboration: CX and Social

One of the most important digital marketing trends in 2024 is the closer collaboration between two different departments: customer experience and social.

In 2024, the integration of Customer Experience (CX) and social media teams will continue to grow, fostering a more collaborative relationship between the two. This collaboration will reshape traditional team structures as social media's impact will continue to show that it goes beyond marketing, reaching the heart of businesses and providing valuable insights to different departments.

As customers increasingly expect brands to meet them where they are—predominantly on social media—2024 will see a natural intertwining of Customer Experience (CX) and social media management.

 

Brands will take charge of routing, ensuring that CX is seamlessly embedded in the social spaces where customers actively seek information and engagement. Instead of customers searching for support numbers or email contacts, businesses will offer quick and personalized help on social networks.

In 2024, the collaboration between Customer Experience (CX) and social media is essential as fan community interactions, customer complaints, FAQs, and purchase intent take center stage. These comments represent critical touchpoints where customers express sentiments or seek assistance. Usually, CX will handle complaints and FAQs, and marketing teams will manage fan communities and purchase intent. This collaboration ensures a comprehensive response, enhancing customer satisfaction and fostering brand loyalty.

 

3. The Rise of Private Messages Importance for Brands

In 2024, we're expecting a shift towards more social media chats happening on messaging platforms, making it crucial for marketers to handle not just comments but also private messages. While content discovery will still happen in public feeds, users are now turning to private messaging as an additional avenue for engaging with brands. In fact, 65% of consumers already use social media messaging apps to contact customer service (Hubspot).

This social media prediction is backed by Meta's move in rolling out Broadcast Channels on Instagram and Facebook - a big group chat, giving brands and creators a more private space to connect with their followers.

As users seek diverse interactions with brands across various channels — be it public mentions, private messages, or comments — it becomes imperative for brands to attend to every touchpoint keenly.

Brands skilled in seamlessly managing all of these interactions will take the lead in their industries, cultivating heightened brand loyalty and customer satisfaction.

 

4. Sentiment: The Metric of Choice

Bid farewell to the era of chasing vanity metrics and get ready for a refreshing outlook in 2024 — one that goes beyond mere numbers and dives into the qualitative essence of social metrics. 

The term "brandformance" has been buzzing around recently, advocating for a smart blend of brand and performance advertising. It's not just about racking up reach and brand lift metrics for brand awareness or honing in on conversions and ROAS for performance. Brands are creating strategies that seamlessly merge both - brand and performance, to navigate the balance between short-term performance gains and long-term brand building.

In 2024, brands will be shifting gears, steering away from just crunching numbers to embracing a more holistic approach that intertwines quantitative KPIs with qualitative insights. And this trend will cast a spotlight on sentiment analysis, which will become a key marketing tool in 2024.

While volumes still matter, the real story lies in unraveling the 'why' behind those numbers. Picture a campaign with a whopping 20,000 comments, going viral and seemingly triumphant. But what if 90% of those comments were negative? 

This is where sentiment comes in. And in 2024, sentiment will be the go-to metric for brands with a data-driven mindset. Brands keen on understanding their community will turn to sentiment to steer future decisions — assessing how a new campaign resonated, gauging the reception of a product launch, or evaluating the overall brand perception on social.

Smarter brands, armed with sentiment as their trusty compass, are set to forge deeper, more authentic connections with their communities in 2024.

 

 

5. Fluctuating Engagement in the Face of Sensitivity

Brands need to be prepared for spikes in comments during the year. In 2023, total comments and harmful comments spiked during the holiday season (December).

In 2023, the anti-LGBTQ+ hate & discrimination spike in May just before Pride Month led to a huge spike in conversation volume (as brands started their LGBTQ+ posts early. Brands should have a solid, well-defined moderation strategy in place and be prepared for escalations at any time.  Ensuring a safe community requires brands to swiftly address and hide any hate speech that may arise. Learn more about How to Deal with Hate on Pride Month Campaigns →

 

6. AI's Continued Reshaping of the Social Media Marketing

Ever since ChatGPT hit the scene in late 2022, we've seen a real buzz around AI adoption. The marketing industry has experienced a significant transformation in the way we create content, interact with our audiences, and analyze data. Looking ahead to 2024, marketers must ready themselves for a landscape where AI becomes a core component of their strategy.

The AI market in social media is expected to reach $3,714.89 million by 2026, recording a Compound Annual Growth Rate of 28.77%. This projected growth not only signifies the rising financial worth of AI in this sphere but also highlights its transformative role as a driving force behind innovation and competitive advantages.

While most people associate AI tools primarily with content creation, its capabilities extend way beyond, offering marketers a broader range of functionalities to spend more time on creativity and strategy:

• 80% of CMOs say AI is essential to their success in the next five years. (Neil Patel)
• 77% of marketers say that reducing the time spent on repetitive tasks is the top outcome they want to achieve with AI. (Marketing AI Institute)

64% of marketers say they have positive feelings about AI’s impact on marketing, business, and society. (State of Marketing AI Report 2023)

7. Social Media's Ascendance in Brand Discovery

This may be one of the most exciting 2024 social media trends - social media becoming as important as search engines for brand discovery.

In 2024, social media is becoming just as crucial as search engines for discovering and researching brands. Among 16-24-year-olds, social media ads take the lead (28.4%) as the go-to source for exploring new products, indicating a shift that extends to older age groups.

For 25-34-year-olds, it's among the top three, and for 35-54-year-olds, it secures a spot in the top four sources, underlining the growing significance of social platforms in shaping consumer preferences and brand interactions.

 

8. The Sustainability Marketing Demand 

Our research uncovered a remarkable volume of customer comments mentioning sustainability being posted on the brand’s comment sections. These messages are a mix of positive affirmations when brands align with eco-friendly practices and negative criticisms when they fall short.