The shine is off the apple. Even marketers are sick of hearing about how great social media is and how it’s going to change everything for everyone forever. I’m not quite there yet — I still delight in pulling together SmartBrief on Social Media each day — but I can understand how the constant din of the Next Big Thing could be deafening for some folks.
But whether you’re tired of hearing about it or not, it’s becoming clear that social-media marketing isn’t the Next Big Thing anymore. It’s just the thing that everyone does.
Grasping the important of that transition is key to the success of your marketing endeavors over the next year for two reasons:
- If you’re sick of hearing about it, imagine how your customers — who have never waxed poetic about mass-communication tools — must feel. They’re not just going to yawn when you proudly unveil your newest social-media account — they’re going to start rolling their eyes. Whatever novelty factor these platforms held is long gone — except, perhaps, for mobile networks. Yesterday, you needed to give your customers a reason to be curious. Today, you need to find a way to be essential.
- If you’ve figured it out, so has the competition. A lot of businesses, especially smaller companies, have put themselves on the map over the past few years by dominating a space their competitors ignored. You can’t count on that any longer. You don’t just have to compete with your rival’s product; you need to best their social presence, too, if you’re going to maintain your marketing edge.
What other big changes does the ubiquity of social media bring to the discipline? Are you personally sick of hearing about social platforms yet? Is mobile really the exception to the rule?
Image credit, Ingrid W. via Shutterstock