What’s Coming Your Way in 2022
A New Year, Shifting Priorities
Is TikTok going to overtake Instagram? Will organic engagement get any better? Is it necessary to go live weekly?
With every platform consistently tweaking its algorithm and adding new features — it’s hard to keep up, let alone know what to do with all the new trends and information.
What can you do in 2022 to stay on top of your game? With the risk of sounding like a broken record — continue to incorporate video into your communication plans.
If you haven’t made the jump already, add Reels and short-form video into your content strategy.
Our advice? Take a deep breath, review our 2022 social media trends recap and see how the trends align with your current communication plans. Experiment, try new features, see what works for you and know that if you need help — we’re just a phone call or email away.
What’s Coming in 2022
Social customer care, Tiktok’s prominence & Instagram’s battle to catch up
Tiktok passed the 1 billion user mark in September 2021 — making it the 4th most popular social media network after Instagram.
While search demand for Tiktok has grown by 173% over the last year, search demand for Instagram Reels has only grown by 22% and it has decreased by 33% for Stories.
In spite of these numbers, most businesses are still hesitant to invest in Tiktok and instead are relying on tried and true networks — Facebook and Instagram.
If you want to understand our current student population and prospective students, Tiktok is the answer. If you’re not already on Tiktok, try it out rather than get left behind. Even if you’re not sold on the platform, it’s short-form content is here to stay. Seeing how others are turning “academic” bits of knowledge into a digestible piece that resonates.
Our suggestions:
· Grab a handle for your account
· Start exploring your For You page to get an idea of what’s out there and how your content can fit in
· Sketch out a content strategy
The Value of Social Listening & Responding
Did you receive a higher volume of messages during the pandemic? We did too. From DMs to comments on posts to replies to stories — our audience is coming to social to ask and get the answers they need.
What does this mean for social overall? Social listening should be incorporated into your current strategy.
Increased demand calls for increased resources — now is the time to allocate resources for social listening and responding.
Here’s a few tips on what you can do in the New Year:
· Create a social media service strategy for how you will monitor and engage
· Create network-specific response templates for frequently asked questions
· Set up search streams to help with social listening
- Account mentions, branded hashtags
- Keywords and hashtags important to your area
Instagram’s refocuses its priorities
Instagram continues to borrow from others & focus on in-app messaging
First came stories (Snapchat), then came Reels (Tiktok).
This year, expect to see Instagram continue to prioritize Reels as it has become the largest contributor to engagement growth on Instagram.
In fact, Instagram plans to double-down its focus on video content and consolidate all video formats around Reels. Reels clips are now being integrated into your main Instagram feed AND Instagram has been automatically defaulting shorter videos into Reels clips as it looks to expand Reels reach and exposure.
Reels tips
In the works: If you were a fan of the chronological feed — you’re one step closer to getting it back.
Instagram’s coming chronological feed toggle
Instagram plans to have a chronological feed toggle to allow users to change their viewing preferences. How this will work out in practice has yet to be seen, but for now it appears it might function like Facebook where you can go in and change settings to see more posts from people you want to see.
