Six Social Media Trends for 2010
by David Armano, November 2, 2009
Hunting around cyber space looking for the latest thinking for trends on 2010... we came across the Harvard Business Article (‘Where Leaders Get Their Edge’) so thought it worthwhile to abridge for you.
Let’s agree that 2009 has seen exponential growth of social media.
Apparently Twitter alone grew 1,382% year-over-year in February, registering a total of just more than 7 million unique visitors in the US for the month (*Nielsen Online). Facebook outpaced MySpace. We have experienced it firsthand within our candidate activity... eye-opening and fascinating.
So – Are you keen to hear about some social media plus other trends on the rise in 2010? Read on...
- Social media begins to look less social?
Groups, lists and niche networks become more popular; so networks could begin to feel more "exclusive."... Perhaps it's not actually less social, but it might seem that way as we all come to terms with getting value out of our networks—while filtering out the clutter.
- Corporations look to scale
Seems to be relatively few big companies that have scaled social initiatives beyond one-off marketing or communications initiatives. Could more companies look to uncover cost savings or serve customers more effectively through leveraging social technology?
- Social business becomes serious play
Out comes the competitor in the user. Participants are incentivized and rewarded through higher participation levels. And push technology is there to remind you that your friends are one step away from stealing your coveted prize. As businesses look to incentivize activity within their internal or external networks, they may include carrots that encourage a bit of friendly competition.
- Your company will have a social media policy (and it might actually be enforced)
If the company you work for doesn't already have a social media policy in place with specific rules of engagement across multiple networks, it just might in 2010. From how to conduct yourself as an employee to what's considered competition, it's likely that you'll see something formalised about how the company views social media and your participation in it.
- Mobile becomes a social media lifeline
With approximately 70 percent of organizations banning social networks and, simultaneously, sales of smart phones on the rise, it's likely that employees will seek to feed their social media addictions on their mobile devices. Could the old cigarette break turn into ‘social media breaks’ ...as long as there is a clear signal and IT isn't looking? We may see more and/or better mobile versions of our favorite social drug of choice.
- Sharing no longer means e-mail
Smart Phone Applications now allow added sharing functionality which lets a user to easily broadcast an article across networks such as Facebook and Twitter. Many websites already support this functionality, and it's likely that we will see an increase in user behavior as it becomes more mainstream for people to share with networks what they used to do with e-mail lists. And content providers will be all too happy to help them distribute any way they choose.
Provided by
Harvard Business—Where Leaders Get Their Edge
