"Mirror mirror on the wall who's the fairest of them all?"
Come on, guys. Admit it. You hear this voice every time you open up your Facebook newsfeed. Social Media has become the new mirror on the wall and all of us are online: businesses, private users, celebrities. Everyone. It's become second nature to us. Scrolling through our newsfeeds, searching for the next big thing. But what if the mirror changes? What does one do? Panic.
Anyone who wants to do business online must always be on the lookout for new cutting edge trends and jump on platforms that are gaining popularity first in order gain new market shares before their competitors.
The clairvoyant is not for everyone
The Social Media world is booming and a winning strategy is usually perceived by a hit forecast so I needed an expert who could help me understand what's been developing on the social media forefront.
I took Facebook and its hand to Saint Joseph’s University and asked Natalie Wood, Chair and Associate Professor of Marketing, to read it. Natalie is also an editorial board member at Journal of Digital and Social Media Marketing. She has been published in many newspapers, among which are: the Journal of Customer Behaviour, Book: IGI Global, Business Expert Press and Business Horizons.
Visual, visual and visual
If you are reading this article you are old fashioned, but don’t worry, as Arnold Schwarzenegger said: "Old, not obsolete". Nowadays, reading has become boring. Our eyes want high definition images, flashing GIFS and fast videos. Anything that we can stare at and immediately understand, we want more of.
Images and videos are the future. To be more specific, platforms that allow people to go live are representing the cutting edge trend for Social Media content in the upcoming years. Facebook live, Snapchat stories, Instagram live and many others have already hopped on this trend, gaining popularity and satisfying their audience's newest demand: the desire to discover and deepen the real personal life of people and popular companies, without the use of filters and artifacts that a good video editor can add.
Virtual reality, 360° videos and much more
Even if I imagined a future like Futurama or The Zero Theorem, complex systems with full body suits that connect users directly inside a virtual world is a concept that has yet to gain traction. Virtual reality still needs time to be digested by people and represents a much more complex scenario both for companies and private users.
What is easier to use and exploit is a concept called augmented reality, that is running parallel to 360° videos. We will see more apps and companies using these technologies, which means mobile devices are going to be king in this area. Companies are investing for mobile rather than laptops or desktops.
WHAT DO YOU THINK
Tell us what you see in your crystal ball and if you are old, not obsolete, tell us what drives your passion for the reading. What do you think will be the next mirror on the wall?
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