Social Media as everyone knows is one of the fastest emerging industries and it will continue to involve year on year. It will get better and bigger as time grows. The speed of social media change is the biggest cliche of our industry. Apart from the recent innovations and changes happening day to day, we must also assess the broader trends that social media is pointing to.

Let us take one by one the 10 Social Media trends of 2017:

1. Live Streaming of Videos: Year 2017 is the year of Live Streaming. This is completely unscripted and unpredictable. This feature is currently available with Instagram and Facebook and it’s it is only available on and then when it’s over it’s gone.

2. Marketing with the use of Algorithms: Social Network algorithms are key elements to brands that reach out to specific audiences.The Internet, chronological or demographic based algorithms are changing now and there are ample of opportunities available.

3. Personalization of Content: The direct rise of messaging between the brand and consumer has the ability to create a personal connection, which often reaches out to users and directly offers coupons and discounts. Be it Facebook, Instagram or Snapchat all are into it.

4. Use of Ephemeral Content: Ephemeral content is raw, unscripted and native. The posts on Instagram and Snapchat are becoming more personalized with Geo-tagging, doodling and filtering for any near occasion.

5. Virtual Reality and Real News: Many companies have reaped huge benefits with the use of Virtual Reality. Virtual Reality which may seem a bit odd offers a unique opportunity for experiencing products, destinations, services and events like never before. Why it is creating so much of buzz, because VR methods are huge and create viral responses among the audiences.Social Media is now dominating the way people consume news. Youngsters are now turning to social media for news. A number of media platforms are now making their efforts to put their contents, real news and information to the millions of users through the use of social media.

6. Automation and AI: Social Media is not untouched by the use of analytics, algorithms and automation. As automation has taken a rise the question for businesses and brands have been drawn between human interaction and automation.

7. Use of Customer Service Chatbots: Many brands have looked into ways to increase their customer centric resources and have turned to chatbots. Popular platforms like Slack and Facebook Messenger have also used chatbots to communicate with customers.

8. Social Shopping: Social Shopping is growing too fast and more networks are providing products of different brands with the easier ways to sell.
   

9. Use of AI Lenses for Instagram and Facebook: Be it Snapchat’s facial filter which makes use of AI has gained popularity or Facebook’s facial lenses both have gained popularity.
   

10. Data- Driven Social Media: Data has transformed the social media which has enabled the reach of the right message to right audiences around the web networks.

In earlier social media trending days it was just all about engagement. Networks later realized that they needed to monetize it. Also, brands now are juggling in business the social media is playing a bigger role.  New platforms and technology being available, marketing opportunities are enormous and the audience which was unreachable earlier is reachable now.