April 2023 Trends Report
Empowered Digital Marketing
Our mission is to inspire creativity, community, and value creation through digital marketing.
Looking to stay ahead of the latest social media trends? Welcome to the Monthly Empowered Social Media Trends Report! We’re here to help you choose the trends that will be most impactful for your business. We actively analyze social media data and deliver a report at the end of each month, so you can stay ahead of the curve.
But first...
We wanted to tell you about some exciting updates regarding our Digital Marketing Learning Library!
Our 10x Growth Course for LinkedIn is launching May 6th!
Description:?Learn how to leverage LinkedIn to grow your business through this comprehensive online course. You'll start by optimizing your personal LinkedIn page, focusing on creating a professional brand identity and building a following. Next, you will move on to build and optimize a LinkedIn Company page, developing content for better engagement and conversion rates on the platform. Finally, you will learn how to use LinkedIn marketing strategies to maximize reach and conversions, enabling you to generate new leads.
Class Format:?Weekly Zoom Online Learning
When:?Fridays in May from 12-1pm (May 5th through May 26th)
*You can sign up for one or all sessions
As of today, we have 6 courses available in the Learning Library:
Upcoming Course Launches:
Learn more about our Learning Library or subscribe now:?https://www.empoweredsocialmediaco.com/learning-library
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Instagram:
Create a Private Instagram Feed with a Friend
You know Spotify Blends? Instagram is trying something similar where you and a friend can view a collaborative feed of content from accounts you both follow, providing another way to enhance engagement.
The new ‘discover content together’ option would add a new feed of content that you’ve both interacted with or from profiles that you both follow, giving you another way to connect over mutual interests.
Instagram’s been looking to find more ways to lean into DMs and private interactions, as a means to boost overall usage. The potential brand use for this one seems limited, but maybe there could also be a way to showcase interests in common with followers, depending on how it functions.
New Birthday Profile Effect
Instagram’s working on a new option to help users celebrate their birthday, with a special birthday photo effect that would be visible on your profile for the day. The new process would enable you to add a birthday effect to your profile image, which would let others know that you’re celebrating – and allow us to stop checking Facebook to verify birthdays.
As Facebook becomes less popular with younger users, Meta may be looking to maintain that functionality across another app, while also adding another reason for more interaction and engagement.
Display Up to 5 Links in Your Profile Bio
Instagram has launched one of its most requested feature updates, giving users the ability to add up to five links in their IG bio, expanding on its capacity to drive traffic.
Which is bad news for Linktree, and other linking tools. Instagram’s opposition to external links has long been the key driver of usage for third-party link aggregator tools, but now, people will be able to replicate that capacity within the app itself, which will no doubt see many abandon their paid subscriptions to third-party apps.
Discover Reels Trends
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Instagram’s added a new discovery element, which will enable creators to find the latest trending audio and hashtags within Reels specifically.
As you can see in these images, through ‘Reels Trends’, which will be available in your Professional Dashboard, you’ll be able to see what audio is driving the most interest at any given time, along with hashtag trends and usage insights.
LinkedIn:
LinkedIn Adds Algorithmically Suggested Posts to Boost Engagement
LinkedIn is the latest social media platform to add in algorithmically recommended posts from across its network, expanding the pool of content that it can display to users in-stream, with the addition of new ‘Suggested Posts’, that will be highlighted to you based on your interests.
Suggested posts will appear with a ‘Suggested’ label in your feed, with LinkedIn’s algorithm seeking to highlight content that may be of interest, based on your engagement activity. Looks like the high level of engagement on TikTok has prompted more consideration of this element by virtually every other app, which is why LinkedIn is now looking to get in on the action.
TikTok:
TikTok Invites Selected Retailers to Expanded Shops Push
After initially testing its in-app shops with selected brands in the US last year, TikTok is now expanding access to its in-profile product display option.
As per TikTok:
“TikTok Shop is your one-stop e-commerce solution for driving sales and brand growth on TikTok. With TikTok Shop, users are able to discover and purchase products from their favorite creators and brands in one seamless experience. With 83% of users saying that TikTok plays a role in their purchase decisions, it’s more important than ever to make your brand and products discoverable to the fastest growing community in the world.”
It remains to be seen whether or not TikTok Shops will succeed but we’ll see if the Shops option becomes available to more brands.
Potential New Apps to Join!
Bluesky
Could Jack Dorsey’s Bluesky be the new and improved Twitter? As legacy checkmarks are removed on Twitter and more and more people abandon the app, Bluesky, the decentralized Twitter alternative, is growing fast. it currently remains invite-only, which will restrict take-up for now. As you can see, it’s essentially a re-skinned version of the classic Twitter UI, and as more people go looking for a Twitter replacement, maybe now is the time for Bluesky to make a move, and expand access to more users.
Barcelona
Meta’s Twitter Alternative ‘Barcelona’ is taking shape. The separate app is now being pitched as ‘Instagram for your thoughts.’ Barcelona will be a separate app, which will use your Instagram credentials to log in. We’ll definitely be learning more as it develops further, but it does seem like everyone is trying to be the new Twitter replacement.
Lemon8
While US senators debate whether or not to ban its main app, TikTok owner ByteDance is already working on building its American presence, with its Instagram-like?Lemon8 app?now rising up the App Store charts.
Lemon8, which is described as ’a place for young creatives to share a diversity of content’, kind of looks like a cross between Instagram and Pinterest, with a focus on products, and highlighting content from specific product categories, including fashion, makeup, food, and travel.
Could Lemon8 become a new platform for marketers to consider? Given the reach and influence of TikTok, that’s definitely a possibility, and it’ll be interesting to see how the app grows in the coming months – if it avoids restrictions.
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Thanks for reading our April trends report!
-The Empowered Team