Top 20 Social Media Future Trends [2020 & Beyond]

Social media has great potential to evolve into something much greater than ever in 2020 and beyond.

The way social media have been developing is quite fascinating. After Facebook was launched back in 2004, the way we are connected to the internet has changed than ever since.

In fact, it is a revolutionary on the internet in my opinion. Don’t believe me?

Check out this data from Google trends in the last five years. You can clearly see that the trend is rising year on year.

20 Social Media Trends In 2020 & Beyond

Here are the top social media trends to follow in 2020:

1. More privacy and security

Privacy has always been the main concern on social media and the internet as a whole. This is because, on a platform like this, we have our information exposed to the platform.

Take Facebook for an example, we sign up for the Facebook account, we need to fill out some basic information about us right?

And as we keep on using it, we are prompted to fill out other related information as well.

These data are then collected by the social media giants. This is the same for all kinds of social media platforms.

Nevertheless, we still trust these platforms to keep our privacy insecure.

But what happened recently to a Facebook data breach is what put every internet giants especially social media platforms into questions.

Is our information really safeguarded?

Because of the way social media are designed, there is no way we can avoid this (provide our information to them).

But what we have really seen is they are pushing towards data privacy and security more than ever before.

Facebook has gone through major updates and renovation in terms of data management.

Other platforms are following the footprints as they have become alerted and they knew that this is going to be a major factor and issues in the near future.

2. The video will become the primary type of content

Video has become a major trend and type of content people prefer to consume. In fact, it is what makes YouTube the second largest search engine in the world.

Who doesn’t love videos right? Videos are a versatile and engaging content format that not only gives us a real-life picture of what is going on.

They are also easy to share across multiple platforms. Consumers like them because they are easy to digest, entertaining and engaging.

They are also the much-loved type of content for marketers because they can potentially give a huge return of investments (ROI).

Because social media are designed for people to connect, share contents and engage, videos are a perfect fit for this.

The major platform like Facebook and Instagram are pushing hard for videos.

Instagram’s recent algorithm give more preferences to videos when they are ranking for the content.

In fact, a study by Cisco stated that by 2020, 75% of the mobile traffic will be video. So now you know what type of content to create on social media right?

3. Heavily focused on AR technology

As the world develops, as so technologies. The much talked about in recent years are AI and AR. 

Now, I bet you have heard or known something about AI. But what is AR exactly? Let me explain this.

AR or Augmented Reality is often confused with virtual reality, but the two are quite different technologies.

While there are certain similarities, virtual reality implies creating a whole new world from scratch – a simulation of the real and the imagined world,

whether it’s going back in time to walk with dinosaurs in realistic landscapes, or traveling to an imagined future where nothing feels familiar.

Augmented reality, on the other hand, takes the real world and projects virtual, computer-generated augmentations to it, in order to enhance our experiences.

The famous platform which has implemented AR is Snapchat.

You know, those fancy camera filters like dogs filters, 3D Bitmoji and pretty much all of its camera features are powered by AR technology.

And just like it’s stories feature, other social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram have also copied this feature, and have been developing on it.

This is because AR will not only be just some fancy camera filters anymore. The potential is endless with this technology.

The reason being it can drastically improve the engagement experience on social media.

Some potential features of AR in the social media future:

1. AR live events
2. AR videos
3. Create more brand awareness
4. Enhance the buying experience and a lot more

4. Become the primary source of news information

As the internet slowly replacing TV and newspapers, more and more people prefer to consume information especially news on the internet.

According to Forbes, 50 percent of Internet users surveyed said that they hear about the latest news via social media before ever hearing about it on a news station. 

Many internet users will see the breaking stories on their feed and go to the news sites to learn more.

The survey found a 57 percent increase in traffic to news sites referred to as social media.

This is because the information is spread out so fast on social media. From one person to another and eventually the whole world knows about it.

Facebook and Twitter have become the main source of news.

The moment something important happen, you can instantly see that the topic’s hashtag becomes trending.

But don’t forget, among the information, there will always be some fake ones and that is probably some disadvantages of social media for your business and data consumption.

The next point is how these social media platforms can tackle this problem.

5. Data segmentation and the use of AI

AI has become the future of a human generation.

Because it can help reduce the workload of human beings, as well as mimic human intelligence, They are the next big thing.

With this advantage, social media platforms have implemented AI into their algorithms in recent years.

The algorithm is mostly responsible for ranking social posts, deciding which contents to display to which type of users, groping of data and much more.

With data on social media becoming more and more complex, AI in the social media algorithm needs to be adapted.

One of the big components is fake news and sensitive data.

In 2020 and the near future, AI will do better and better in segmenting data, and make sure that the algorithms provide the best content possible.

Fake news and sensitive information will be filtered out in a more advanced way than today.

(some of the information still need to be filtered out manually by a human) and overall the information consumption experience will be enhanced more and more.

I cannot stress enough how important AI will be to the human future and social media as a whole.

The more we develop, as so AI. Ultimately, we may reach the point where AI can fully replace human beings.

Could it be possible right? What do you think? Please let me know in the comment section.

6. Can do stuff online more than ever before

With people becoming more and more ”lazy” and are depending on technologies to make their lifestyles much more easier and comfortable,

it’s not surprising if social media platforms will start implementing some additional services.

As you can see, right now you can buy products through the Facebook marketplace and Instagram store.

Surely, in the near future, social media can do more than this. This could include things like pay money using their own cryptocurrency, which Facebook has already started with Libra.

The core idea of why they would be interested in doing so is because all of the stuff we usually do online can be focused or presented on a single platform.

The ability of social media to connect is also another reason why this would prove to be a powerful feature if implemented.

7. Engagement will become more important

Engagement, engagement, engagement. Why are we hearing this term everywhere nowadays?

Well, this is because it really shows that people are interested in your content.

There used to be times in the past when likes and follows are the main factors of representing how popular or authoritative your content or profile is on social media.

But because these two features can be easily fabricated (fake likes and followers), social media algorithms will now be heavily focused on engagement, mainly comments, shares and live features.

We started seeing this in the past few years on Instagram, Facebook and even on LinkedIn.

The post which gets lots of comments, replies or live video feed gets ranked and reach better than simple text, images or even the one with lots of likes but no comments.

So make sure when you are posting on social media, focus on video (as mentioned in the above point), and the contents are engaging.

Ask a question in the post and try replying to every comment.

8. Will represent themselves as certain types of search engines

Now, this is obviously social media going to position themselves in the near future. Some of them already have done it – YouTube, platforms for videos and the world’s second-largest search engine.

Each social media platform has its own unique type of information or what they focus on.

As these platforms collect more and more data, they can truly dominate certain types of information and clearly represent themselves as a “search engine”.

Take LinkedIn for example. It is used to find jobs and connect like-minded people in businesses.

Do you think in the next 2-5 years, with more and more professionals joining LinkedIn, can they truly become the world’s largest job finding search engine? Possible right?

And with the potential feature mentioned above that more and more stuff online could be done through social media,

people will start to use these platforms more of like a place to find certain types of information, rather than always head to Google.

So the potential here is huge and probable. 

9. Automation and chatbots will become more advance

This feature will definitely benefit you if you have a business online. For businesses, responses and replies to customers are essentials.

Imagine, if you are a potential client looking for some online service, and you happen to message a service provider on Facebook, but no reply after some time. What will you do?

Obviously, you are going to find another provider right?

Sure, currently there’s an auto-responder feature but imagine a human-like chatbot literally replying to your customer and ultimately closes the deal. Wouldn’t that be great?

The market of chatbots and automation has been a great trend over the past few years.

More and more human-like features are being implemented and developed. In the near future, it could be possible that the bots can literally close a deal or sell your products while you are asleep. Who knows.

10. More and more “social on social” community will arise

This would not come as a surprise as the more people get connected, the greater the community will be and grow.

With many social media supporting group like features, this makes it much easier to form a mini social network community around certain topics.

In the future, I think, as more and more such type communities are formed, the information in certain niche or topics can be easily found or filtered. 

Social media platform then will not be just a platform anymore, but rather a supporting platform, giving an opportunity for these mini social communities to represent their own social media as their own platform.

11. The Facebook group will become important

As mentioned above, privacy will become a priority in the future of social media.

With this, Mark Zuckerberg has announced that Facebook group will become Facebook’s new future.

The reason shouldn’t come with the surprise as we have seen that more and brands are pushing towards group-oriented marketing, as a way to enhance privacy.

With the Facebook group feature, brands will be able to deliver their messages more personalized, thus leverage their social media marketing strategies.

12. Podcasts go social

2019 has seen a huge rise in podcast trend worldwide. According to the stats, 22% of Americans listen to podcasts each week.

This is a big jump from 17% last year and represents 62 million Americans, and the trend is expected to grow even further.

With social media becoming more dominant in the way we communicate and interact online, no doubt as to why podcasts would find its way into social media.

Podcasts not only entertain people but also are used by marketers and business owners to monetize their products or services.

Thus, I strongly believe that it will prove to be a huge social trend in 2020 and beyond, for both consumers and marketers on social media.

13. Live content will dominate

Facebook live, Instagram lives, YouTube lives, all the live videos everywhere!

Social media live feature has always been a trend since the major platforms started adopting it.

It’s engaging, personal, fun, and what’s important is you get a chance to communicate directly with the one you’re following.

As mentioned above, engagement will become important in social media. With the live feature being super engaging, no doubt as to why it won’t continue to dominate the social trend in the upcoming future.

14. Rise of more influencers

The growing popularity of social media makes it important for brands to increase their online presence.

Every day, small and medium brands are fighting to rise to the top spots. Marketers always looking for an innovative and effective way to promote their presence, and that’s where influencers come into play.

We have seen the rise of more and more influencers over the years. In 2019, 80% of social media marketers find influencer marketing effective.

This type of social media marketing tactic works especially well with visual-based social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram.

We can safely predict that in 2020 and beyond, more and more social media influencers will rise and play an important role in creating brand awareness.

15. Short, crispy information will become a go-to choice

Short-type information such as stories, IGTV or any kind of short duration, entertaining social media information will be preferred more in 2020.

This data is backed by the latest stats as listed below:

• 10,079 Stories were published – compared to 8,949 feed posts, 205 IGTV posts and 125 live posts
• 98% of accounts used Stories
• Almost a quarter of brands posted Stories on a daily basis, with nearly a third posting a few times a week and a quarter posting them once a week

So why has this type of information become more popular?

• Innovative – This type of information is still relatively new and people like new stuff
• Authentic – Information like stories give real authentic values and insights to the audience
• Easy to use and engaging – It’s very easy and super engaging with this type of content. Don’t you think so?
• Save tons of time – It takes hardly less than 5 minutes to consume tons of information in an easy-to-view way than at least 15 minutes to go through the entire feed.

Are you convinced now? Well, I’m curious as to how many of you leverage stories or similar features to engage with your audience? Let me know in the comment below.

16. Social media ads will play an important role

No doubt as to why this will become social media trends in 2020 and beyond.

With social media becoming more and more popular, opportunities there have been tremendously increased.

Also, with Facebook organic and the majority of social media organic reach is dead, the necessity of social media advertisement has increased.

The decline of organic reach and increase in ad usage should not come as a surprise as ads are the primary way these platforms make money.

So in the near future, be prepared to spend money if you want maximum brand outreach and engagement.

17. Personalization is the key

Personalization is always the key to any success in marketing tactics.

In fact, this isn’t anything new. Personalization in the online world is everywhere. From personalized Facebook feed, Amazon products suggestions to Google’s personalized search, it’s everywhere!

The more personalized your platform is, the better you can succeed. This is a universal truth.

But with privacy and transparency becoming more concerned, social media platforms will have a hard time figuring how to balance between privacy and personalization (as personalization requires your data for suggestions)

We will see how this goes in the future.

18. May become a primary source of sales for E-commerce stores

This is probably good news for many of the e-commerce store owners out there who rely on social media to make sales.

For so many years, search engines like Google and Amazon have dominated the commercial business, primarily e-commerce.

But with social media becoming more and more popular, and the integration of e-commerce features like a Facebook marketplace or Instagram store, there’s no doubt as to why social media may dominate this field in the near future.

I believe that with the ever-evolving features, social media platforms will definitely release more useful features to support this.

19. Social media TV

With now people consuming online content more than ever before, the internet is slowly replacing the TV.

We’ve seen the trend in streaming channels like Netflix, YouTube, etc. dominating the field. So why can’t social media replace TV right?

In fact, the TV itself is changing to keep up with the trend. With an introduction to Samsung’s smart vertical television, which they said are “preferred more” by the millennials, the tradition TV is dying.

20. Rise of new social media platform

In 2019, TikTok has over 500 million active users worldwide, and the number is increasing.

Within just 2 years, the platform has become such a great hit among teens. Besides, other new social media platforms like Caffeine and Lasso are also gaining popularity.

So I think in 2020 and near future, we will see the rise of more and more new social media platforms and they will be dominating.

Who knows? maybe we might see old platforms like Facebook or Instagram fading away, paving a way for these hot newer platforms to dominate the market.

Conclusion

And that’s all for the 20 social media future trends 2020 and how they have the potential to evolve.

Many of them are happening right now and we can clearly observe this, and the trend is rising as well.

Some feature, however, maybe probable as with the popularity and huge investments into these platforms, the possibilities are endless.

As more and more people depend on technologies and connections using the internet, social media will continue to evolve. 

So what do you think of these trends? Do you have any other ideas or logical reasons for how social media will evolve in this near future? Let me know in the comment section

If you like the content, help me share it out with the world!