New media-heads have been busy. Long hours have been spent polishing our crystal balls, and developing our (un)tried and true predictions for the implications of Social Media for 2009. That being said, feast your eyes on our 2009 Social Media forecast:
1. Consumer satisfaction / customer service are absolute musts!
Be good to your clients & customers, or they will dislike you, and defame on Youtube, Facebook, & Twitter, to name a few accessible soapboxes.
2. Companies hire “Community Managers.”
The power of social media has actually produced a new occupational trade. Unemployed? Want to turn consumer frowns upside down? Companies that struggle with Rule #1 are finding a growing need to temper moods of unsatisfied customers, with either the goal to keep them loyal – or simply keep them quiet. Community managers also serve to facilitate active communications with the companies’ biggest fans, fostering residual applause and flattery, without the PR agency price tag.
3. Yes, we are on the air…
We are going to see everything as it happens, in real-time through a variety of media sources/ networks. Oh yes, we will see the good, the bad and everything else – with little to buffer us from our connected, streaming worlds. Have kids? “Earmuffs!”
4. Do you MOSOSO?
Mobile Social Software will rush in full-force, and like everything else, join the list of things “we don’t know how we ever lived without.”
5. All aboard the Social Media train!
Tightened budgets will not thwart marketing activity in 2009. Instead, 2009 will be full of smarter marketing. Investing in “community” is free, and proving more effective than even the costliest of media. A Social Media presence takes time and these communities are not built overnight. Good thing you hired your community manager yesterday. Even the B2B’s will come out to play, producing private online networks. There, they can personally connect with and serve their clients, with both parties taking a collaborative dip in the community pool.
6. Social Capital is the new SEO (Search Engine Optimization).
With over 600,000 Facebook users joining daily, and over 3 million “tweets” on Twitter a day…much of the Internet has been occupied by social media conversation. Social Capital is the power of one’s social network in referring business. To gain social capital, you must link to, and develop relationships with others that are also well connected. In the same way blogs changed our search results in the last couple years, social media is doing the same.
7. Some fear becoming white noise.
With everyone networking and talking online, (including dogs – http://apps.facebook.com/dogbook/) … at what point will it be too much? With the exponential growth of this online world, overpopulation and limited resources are both looming threats. You may be wondering, “If I speak, will anyone hear me?” This is why managing your presence closely and creatively is of growing importance.
So get ready for Social Media in 2009 – everybody and their brother!
A year full of online blabbing, some love, some slander, corporate damage control, better customer service, real reality TV, increased driving distractions, cost-effectiveness, smarter marketing, a new way to tackle SEO, weird dog owners talking through their pets, and the challenge to perpetually evolve and reinvent ourselves within the ever-changing new media landscape.
