Sprout Social: 2020 Social Media Index Report

Sprout Social has released its new Social Media Index Report, outlining the goals, challenges, and plans for social media marketers in 2020.

Promotion and audience are both goals and challenges

Seven in ten respondents (69%) said increasing brand awareness was the most commonly chosen primary goal for social media marketing. Other common goals among respondents were to grow their brand’s audience (46%), promote content (44%), increase community engagement (43%) and drive sales (40%).

When it comes to building strategy around these goals, marketers are influenced by a number of factors: 60% (59%) focus on their performance to date, while roughly the same number (57%) focus on their social marketing goals and objectives. Meanwhile, 52% look at customer feedback, while another 45% look at trending topics and interests.

Participation brings social

The majority of marketers (59%) believe that engagement with their audience is what makes their brands achieve the best social marketing results. They also rank memorable content (46%) and engaging stories (45%) as the best social marketing factors, while 37% of respondents cite strong customer service.

While consumers were not as strong as marketers in their preference for engaging storytelling (32%) and pop culture references (18%), they did cite the top three characteristics of standout social marketing: creativity ranked first, memorable content ranked second, and influencers ranked third.

Live streaming is the hottest trend

The majority (56%) of marketers plan to try live video, with a further 48% looking to use Stories.

Other trends include user-generated content (41%), employee advocacy (35%), stickers and widgets (33%), and AMA sessions (24%).

The PDF version will be shared on 199IT Knowledge Planet, just scan the QR code below!