Fast-forward to the waning months of 2016, and the magic is a little harder to feel. Certain corners of the social world have become uglier places, with some in the business world calling for a draw-down. But the pitfalls of political partisanship weren't the only things companies struggled to circumnavigate last year. From a more practical standpoint, it turned out that just having an audience on social media doesn’t mean you actually get to reach it.
And as we head into 2017, the fact that social media is paying ever fewer dividends to many brands and their marketers is becoming more apparent. So what comes next?...
This article details how social media will be used by companies in 2017, and compares it to previous uses throughout the years. The source of this article comes from the British business magazine Fast Company, which appears to be a credible, popular magazine for companies created by former editors of the Harvard Business Review, and has a high number of subscriptions and followers on social media. The concepts and ideas in this article are very reasonable; they detail how far social media has come in the last decade, but they also present the problem of continually reinventing and using social media to advance your company. The article presents a seemingly paradoxical situation, wherein a company can reach a wide audience, but is unable to connect with them. It details the strengths and weaknesses associated with social media, and presents predictions about the future, such as the importance of getting your own employees to share brand items on their personal accounts. Many companies can take this article’s advice, and heed its warnings about trying to over connect or making mistakes on social media. It offers a good blend of new and old ideas, and offers sound advice on balancing company social media marketing with social media marketing done by users for the company.