Branding is a necessity for any growing business and it is important for the brand to stand out in the market by constantly being updated with the latest marketing trends and tools. The first step in building a successful brand is to have a strong digital presence. Digital presence is ever-changing and the success of building a brand depends on analyzing the market trends, likes and preferences of the audience and to meet their expectations by providing good online campaigns and visually engaging social media content.

While marketing strategies like content marketing, influencer marketing and search engine optimization have their share in driving traffic, Social Media Marketing stands atop of other marketing strategies as this is the platform where the brand can bring in direct customer engagement on a wider scale. It is also observed that users tend to remember only 20% of the written content without any visual elements. Hence using a visually creative message is more effective and enhances a brand’s message. Be it a launch announcement, a new partnership or a product offer; social media platforms are the most sought after medium for businesses to target their audience reach. Besides driving traffic to the website, social media marketing allows the business to carefully analyse the content’s reach, engagement rate and the success metrics of the campaign.

Here are few trends in social media content that garners the attention of audiences and is taking the internet by storm.

1.  Memes‍

Memes rank first in engagement rate as most of the target set of audience enjoy these types of hilarious or sarcastic take on issues or matters that needs notice. Memes are usually visual elements that contain a funny image, a video or a piece of text that is copied and re-captioned. They work best for brands that are B2C as memes have good number of shares.

2.   GIFs‍

These are the second most trending social media content that has great number of reaches and engagement rate. These too are visual elements which is more of a short video that is being used more commonly now than ever. GIFs are mobile friendly and keep the users hooked onto the message. The impulse of sharing the GIFs is instant and the increase in the engagement rate is said to be higher than most of the content.

According to Giphy’s CEO, Alex Chung, a picture may be worth a thousand words, but  as “the average GIF contains sixty frames, then they’re capable of conveying 60,000 words – the same as the average novel.”

3. Polls‍

Having online polls is one of the successful marketing strategies as it gives a deeper understanding about the customer preferences and prospects. Big brands like Starbucks and Coca-Cola prefer implementing polling strategies to understand their audiences better and to engage them. Contrary to the traditional polls and surveys that pops up while visiting a website or a page, using Facebook polls has access to larger audience segment and engages them.

4.  Live streaming

Live streaming is a great option to engage with audiences in real time. This too can be used for businesses that are B2C. These are great for product launches, live events, interviews and for even live trainings. The engagement rate is high in live streaming as the audience get to have a direct interaction with the brands. Live streaming helps in building a relationship with similar interests.

5. Facebook Quiz

Another trending social media content is the online quiz. Though the quiz does not promote the brand directly it gets attention from audiences and increases the engagement rate and with the right strategy these quizzes can be used to reach out to a defined audience segment by strategically crafted questions and quiz title. If done right, these fun quizzes help the business to understand the audience and the market better.

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