29 Latest Social Media Trends That You Should Follow in 2024

Social media has managed to become an integral part of our lives in a short time. What started as a medium to stay in touch with friends and family soon became a channel for brands and businesses to connect with their target audience through well-crafted social media strategies.

With the rapid growth of this medium, numerous social media trends have emerged and evolved over the years. Adapting to these new and upcoming trends is what helps businesses keep abreast of the fierce competition.

Top 29 Social Media Trends to Watch Out For in 2024

We’ve compiled a list of top social media trends for 2024 that every marketer should follow for better engagement and improved online visibility.

AI Will Be a Game Changer

AI writing and marketing tools are gaining increasing popularity at the moment. ChatGPT, for example, attracted over one million users in less than a week of its launch. 

Plus, big brands in the search engine market, including Google and Microsoft, are integrating new AI capabilities to make online search more interactive and generate easily digestible answers to user queries.

That said, brands are likely to leverage AI tools to get content ideas and create social media posts that address customers’ pain points and provide on-the-go answers.

On the other hand, the use of AI tools in social media will also open doors for faster execution in terms of social media posting. In fact, according to a recent  Hootsuite study, 61% of organizations say the #1 reason they use AI for social media is to reduce staff workload. The study also forecasts that AI use will skyrocket on various grounds, including content editing and refining, generating and editing images, using chatbots to respond to messages and more.

But here’s the catch. AI writing tools can’t replace human writers in terms of creativity, thought leadership and originality. 

That said, businesses that don’t overuse AI tools and are cautious enough to maintain a human touch in their social media content are likely to perform better than brands that rely heavily on such tools.

With AI tools going mainstream, we may see new players in the market in the years to come.

TikTok Will Still Be a Massive Hit

Followed by the hype for short videos, TikTok will secure one of the top slots in social media trends for 2024.

While TikTok first came up to be a platform for people, especially youngsters, to show off their dance moves and other artistic talents, it has moved beyond that.

With the unleashing of features like ads and business profiles, the platform is expected to be an integral part of the social media game.  

Business owners can leverage TikTok to feature short and creative videos to engage their target audience and create brand awareness. Plus, these videos come in handy for businesses to pitch their services real quick and crisp.

Social Media Will Be A Destination For Online Search

Today’s users, especially youngsters, use social media platforms to perform online searches.

In fact, Google themselves have admitted that 40% of searches happen on social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram.

Given the scenario, if brands want themselves to be found easily on social media, they have to optimize their posts with the right keywords.

So, will social media be the new Google? Well, at this point, I may not be surprised if a question like this pops in your head.

To answer that, it’s a no.

Holding more than 90% of the search engine market share, Google is by far, the biggest industry player.

However, with people beginning to do online searches on social media, you should start doing SEO for your posts so that they show up for relevant searches.

Full-Screen Content Will See Better Engagement

Users love the comfort of accessing social media content on full-screen without having to flip their devices horizontally.

In fact, vertical videos see a whooping 90% completion rate. That’s clearly a sign of better customer engagement.

Following TikTok and Instagram, YouTube and Facebook now support full screen vertical videos.

Therefore, brands are more likely to create videos with an aspect ratio of 9:16 (full-screen) to help customers watch videos in a hassle-free way.

YouTube Shorts Kick Off

According to Statista, YouTube Shorts attract an average of 30 billion daily views across the world. This is probably a reflection of users moving on to short-form videos.

Creators who come up with Shorts are able to get more people to view their long-form videos. Just like midway storytelling, this strategy comes in handy to stimulate curiosity and prompt visitors to watch corresponding long-form videos.

Plus, with the upcoming monetization possibilities using YouTube Shorts, brands are likely to double down on this feature for a wider audience reach.

Brand Enhancement and One-on-One Interaction Through Social Media Will Be More Prominent

Brand interactions with customers isn’t something uncommon. However, in the post-COVID era, customers expect more personalized, quick responses than the generic ones like predefined auto responses.

Imagine you want to reach out to a brand for a query or to share feedback. Will you send them an email and keep waiting for days together for their reply, or drop a message in their social media inbox and get your query addressed in minutes to a few hours? The answer is obvious. Customers endorse businesses that respond quickly. Social media is an ideal tool for businesses to execute it.

In fact, 64% of Twitter users say that they would they would reach out to the dedicated support handle rather than calling a business.

Brands will use social media as a  move to build their brand reputation and provide personalized customer support. This way, social media is expected to transform into a space for businesses to hold one-to-one interaction with prospective customers, existing clients and other stakeholders to bolster reputation building.

Nostalgia Becomes a Marketing Strategy

With Gen Z’s resurgence of 90s and Y2K trends, products from the 90s and early 2000s are making a comeback. Yes, walking down the memory lane has become a trend in itself.

Why did Potterheads wait hawk-eyed for the telecast of Return to Hogwarts, a television special celebrating the 20th Anniversary of  Harry Potter? One Word. Nostalgia. What started as a flame is now spreading like a forest fire.

Let me give you another example. Flare pants, colorful butterfly clips and all-denim outfits from a couple of decades ago aren’t hard to come by now, right? That’s because customers look for stuff that reminds them of the good old days and fall in love with those accessories yet again.

Given the scenario, this year, brands are more into giving a retro makeover to their products and using nostalgia as a marketing strategy on social media to fuel their sales.

Social Media Crisis Management Becomes A Necessity

Social media is expected to be widely used for crisis management in the days to come.

According to a recent Twitter report, 61% of respondents opine that brands should acknowledge crises in their advertising and communications.

In the digital age we live in, information spreads faster, especially on social media. This may sometimes land brands in crisis, which is part and parcel of any business.

When left unaddressed, a small issue is likely to transform into a massive one and result in a big blow for any brand.

Not all businesses have a crisis team in place. But rhe good news is social media platforms can act as effective crisis management tools.

Given the expectations for brands to address crises effectively, we may see more businesses investing in crisis management through social media platforms.

Integrations May Play A Major Role in Social Media User Engagement

Integrations are the next big thing on social media.

Facebook, for instance, has integrated digital avatars in the metaverse as a move to improve user engagement.

Following Facebook, Instagram is also investing in integrations in order to empower creators by allowing them to create content in the metaverse.

With the metaverse being in trend, many such integrations may happen across social media platforms in 2024 and beyond.

Gaming Becomes the New Social Media Playground

Gaming is predicted to hit a net value of $200+billion in 2024.

What does that mean for businesses and social media?

With social media being a tried and tested channel for ads, gaming has exciting opportunities in store for brands in 2024.

Organizing live events and competitions for gamers on social media will help brands take advantage of these social conversations and translate them into business opportunities.

That said, brands are likely to host such gaming based events to entice more followers and also partner with gaming companies to expand their reach.

Brand Authenticity Will Be Paramount

Do you know more than 80% of customers say that they count on brand authenticity and transparency?

Yes. People are more likely to buy from brands they trust rather than opting for random, unfamiliar businesses.

Given the scenario, it is expected that businesses will invest time, effort and money to establish their authenticity, genuineness and thought leadership.

Clearly, social media platforms like LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and others are a go to place to execute it effectively.

Gated Content Will Be Trending

These days, users are drawn more towards content that specifically interests them than the randomly suggested social media posts.

That’s the major reason behind the rise of gated content.

Gated content is content that’s exclusively available to subscribers and top fans. 

Brands are expected to use features like Instagram Subscribers and Facebook Top Fan to come up with gated content in order to strengthen their connection with loyal followers.

Helping businesses in establishing a stronger connection with their prospects, gated content will be a prominent brand strategy in 2024.

Midway Storytelling Will Be Around

Reading a long narrative from the beginning may be a boring business, but catching a glimpse of it somewhere in the middle is likely to kindle curiosity.

Telling a story midway is a sure-shot at hooking up the attention of users on social media.

I mean what’s more interesting than making people want to find out more?

Businesses will use this technique to tell followers their brand stories, build trust and get more conversions.

User-generated Content Will Get More Impetus

User-generated content (UGC) is any form of content generated by users on social media. Many brands have started leveraging UGC as social proof of the quality of their products or services.

Many brands actively promote user-generated content as a part of their branded content. By doing so, they reap two benefits. The first benefit is that they can cut on the marketing budget of branded content by displaying UGC, and second, it allows them to bring customers to the forefront and make them feel valued.

UGC is entirely authentic as brands don’t have control over what users might say or post. It is the most trustworthy source of information anybody could get about a brand or a business. In the coming days, brands will encourage their customers for UGC to boost their engagement rate further. So do add UGC to your social media calendar for stellar branding.

Social Commerce Will Keep Growing

Many brands are already using social media platforms like Instagram and Facebook to sell their products and generate more revenue.

Did you know that social commerce is expected to hit $80 billion in 2025?

That said, social media is no longer going to be a place just for big names. In 2024, more retail businesses will be seen to harness Instagram Storefronts, shoppable posts and more to boost sales and increase their profit margins.  

So, if you’re looking forward to using social commerce to your advantage this year, you need to ensure you opt for a design that complements a smooth and hassle-free shopping experience.

Third-Party Cookies Are Going Away

Do you know 95% of users actually reject cookies?

It’s true that cookies are a great way for marketers to provide users with personalized content. However, people are quite frustrated over cookies and are more concerned about their privacy.

In fact, Google is going to phase out third-party cookies from Chrome by 2024.

That said, we can expect to see more privacy-focused measures to roll out in 2024 and beyond.

Brands on social media may have to ensure customer privacy and transparency to magnetize more followers and win their confidence.

Brands to Continue Investing in Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing is dominating in 2024, and it will continue to do so for the next few years. However, the way through which brands and influencers collaborate will see changes in the coming days.

Brands will now collaborate with influencers over a series of social media promotion posts and not just for a single promotion post. They will put equal effort into promoting the content created by these influencers.

Bigger brands are expected to collaborate with micro-influencers and niche bloggers to bring inclusivity and transparency to their marketing efforts. This also means that brands will be cautious in choosing influencers and crack down on imposters thriving on fake followers.

When it comes to endorsing branded products or services, influencers can no longer get away with posting pictures of themselves with the product. They also need to put equal efforts into content creation for brands, focusing more on long-form content, how-to videos, demos, and photo stories.

In fact, these days, influencers promote products by kindling the curiosity of their followers instead of blatantly recommending them to buy those products. How?

Suppose you watch a video or a reel of your favorite influencer putting on a good pair of shoes just as they talk about anything and everything other than the shoes. Now, scroll down to the comment section and you are likely to see people asking for or discussing the shoe brand in question.

That’s the aftermath of an effective product placement by an influencer. This product placement in influencer marketing is a sure-shot social media trend in 2024 and beyond, mainly because today’s customers rely on first-hand user reviews and testimonials when it comes to purchasing products and services.

Plus, social media channels are now offering exclusive monetization options for influencers to support them in securing their future as they work hard to leverage brands. Many social media platforms like Facebook and YouTube have launched a paid subscription model for followers to get exclusive content, which is a new social media trend today.

The LinkedInfluencer Culture Will Flourish

LinkedIn + Influencer = LinkedInfluencer

Doesn’t seem like these two words go together, right?

Well, in 2024, they do.

Unlike other social media platforms where any Tom, Dick or Harry can be present, LinkedIn is a space dedicated to professionals and industry leaders.

Having said that, influencing is a relatively new concept when it comes to LinkedIn.

However, the platform has rolled out features like LinkedIn Creator Mode and also initiated the creator accelerator program to help achieve a wider reach. 

All these are expected to prompt professionals to create great content to establish their field expertise, interact more frequently, and boost their following on the platform.

More Brands Will Use Social Media For Lead Generation

Gone are the days of using third-party cookies for lead generation. As a baby step in its testing, Google has already phased out third-party cookies in Chrome for 1% of users starting January 4th, 2024. The search engine giant has plans to expand third-party cookie restrictions to 100% of users in Q3 2024.

That pushes brands to find worthy alternatives to generate leads and pull up their business ROI. Now, social media will be one of the immediate targets.  As a result, more businesses are likely to start using social media for lead generation.

Brands may use strategies like creating targeted social ads, launching referral campaigns, sharing client testimonials as social proof, building influencer partnerships and more to magnetize qualified leads using social media.

Brands Will Leverage Social Media For Accelerated Content Distribution

There’s no better platform than social media for brands to get their content noticed faster by their target audiences out there. 

Plus, social media allows one-click sharing that prompts users to share their favorite content from others’ social handles on their timelines without any hassle. Every share is a chance for the brand in question to get more eyeballs on their content to showcase their industry expertise and attract new sales opportunities.

Social media content has a better shelf life compared to other platforms. Once a brand puts up a social media post, it stays there as long as the authorized admin of the business page removes it and doesn’t violate the guidelines of the corresponding social media platform. This allows users to access a brand’s content as and when they want. 

In 2024, businesses will continue to leverage social media to accelerate their content distribution in a streamlined manner.

Staying Unique Will Be More Important

The audience doesn’t want to visit a brand’s social media page to find out that it says the same old things that similar businesses out there have told a hundred times. To create a unique brand identity, a brand has to be unique in itself.

In this fast-paced world, customers are constantly after what’s new. That’s why, in 2024, it is important that brands tell their own fresh stories to offer a whole new experience for their customers. 

Brands that can manage to maintain this freshness in the way they communicate with the target crowd will be successful, while those that beat around the bush stay stagnant or, in the worst case, get wiped out of business.

New Websites will Use Social Media for Traffic Generation

Do you know that over 2,50,000 new websites are being created every day? But Google doesn’t index and rank new websites overnight. Given the scenario, newborn websites rely heavily on social media to get the initial push and generate some traffic.

With the flooding of new websites created, we expect that more and more new websites will use social media platforms to drive traffic to their website, especially because ranking organically on Google and other search engines takes time.

Additionally, joining relevant social media groups and communities will help newbie websites get more visitors who are genuinely interested in what is offered. This will also build awareness of new brands among the target audience and quicken search engine ranking for respective websites.

That said, social media will be a go-to place for new websites to get Google to notice them and begin traffic generation simultaneously.

Brands Will Be Selective With Social Platforms

With a multitude of social media platforms, in 2024, brands will be more selective about the social spaces they will invest time and effort in. 

According to the Hootsuite survey, LinkedIn, Instagram and WhatsApp are the top three social platforms that win the confidence of a majority of brands. Followed by these, Facebook bags the fourth place. 

Launched in the second half of 2023, Threads, a brainchild of Meta, is another social media platform that has gained significant popularity in a short span of time. Its integration with Instagram makes content sharing easier.

So, it is expected that brands will be more active on these few social networking platforms than the others.

Memes Will Continue to Rule

Memes are everywhere and in everything, and it’s hard to find someone who doesn’t like them.

They are one of the most creative content forms so far and a hotcake in the market at the moment. 

With a tinge of creativity, you can tailor memes to fit in any context and convey any message with its elegance untouched. 

Niche-specific memes are a great way for creators to seamlessly connect with their audience and promote a brand often without losing the fun element.

This way, memes open doors for brands to converse and build relationships with their target audience in 2024.

Social Audio Will be More Prominent

Numbers speak louder than words. Let me give you some numbers as to why social audio will be a trend for years to come.

According to the Social Media Trends 2023 survey by Hootsuite, 74% of businesses are interested in investing in audio-only content.

Additionally, Clubhouse, an audio-based social networking platform, has been a sought-after place for online users ever since its launch in 2020. Meanwhile, Facebook also launched Live Audio Rooms, Soundbites and podcasts to bolster audio conversations.

Now, that’s a clear sign of increasing competition for social audio and as a rule of thumb, anything that’s facing high competition is trending.

Video Captions Will Be Paramount

Posting short videos on social media is a good way to clearly convey your brand message to your target audience within their limited attention span.

As you now know, social media will be a major lead generation funnel in 2024. That said, one of the major reasons for brands to maintain a consistent social presence is to widen their reach and attract more customers.

BEWARE. If you don’t add captions to your social media videos, they may not be able to achieve the goal. People are likely to scroll past your post if they don’t understand what your video content says at first glance.

Adding subtitles to video content will help brands get increased social engagement. That said, captioning video content in the social media space is a must for businesses in 2024.

Entertainment Will Lead the Way to ROI

Finding entertainment is one of the core purposes for people to use social media. Ignoring the fun part of it and getting too promotional or deeply educational on social media may not work for brands anymore.

Businesses should learn to master the art of using the entertainment aspect of social media to turn the table in their favor and get more eyeballs focusing on them. Adding a pinch of entertainment and fun to the purpose-driven content is the ideal way for brands to stay competitive on social media at the moment.

 In 2024, brands that publish entertaining content on social media, including memes and GIFs, will succeed more in attracting the attention of prospects and translating them into engagement than the ones that keep sharing content in a conventional way.

Inclusivity Will Continue to Be in the Limelight

The global audiences are now reacting to social issues more than ever before. Given the scenario, they connect better with brands that reflect the common voice.

For example, when protests against racial discrimination spiked in the US in 2020, it did create a global impact that the India-based (formerly) ‘Fair & Lovely’ beauty cream was rebranded as ‘Glow & Lovely’ to emphasize positive beauty. That was clearly a genuine response to the social issue.

So, inclusivity is expected to take a deep root in the social media landscape this year and beyond. 

Businesses that take steps to incorporate this trend into their marketing campaigns and keep up the promises they make to their customers can build better customer relationships and improve their brand credibility.

Sustainability and Environment Aren’t Empty Words Anymore

Buzzwords related to the environment, such as sustainability and eco-friendly, are still trending. But they aren’t just words anymore. Today’s consumers want to see it happen.

But what does that mean for brands?

Suppose a brand says “Save Trees”. Customers want to see if they are actually saving trees.

That said, brands are expected to use their social media handles not just to deliver product or service-based value to users but also to showcase that they care about the environment.

To Conclude!

There are a number of social media trends that will rule the year 2024 and have a massive impact on the users, as well as brands. If you haven’t adapted to these new trends year, it’s time you do so to leverage your brand on social media and stay ahead of the competition.