Where Do We Go from Here? Social Media for 2024

The social media landscape has changed drastically over the course of this year. What does that mean for our clients as we plan for 2024?

 

Transcript

Michelle Kane (00:03):

Thank you for joining us for another episode of That's Solo Life, the podcast for PR pros and marketers who work for themselves, people like me, Michelle Kane, with VoiceMatters and my ever steady co-host, Karen Swim with Solo PR Pro. Hi Karen. How are you doing today?

Karen Swim, APR (00:21):

Hey, Michelle. I am very chilly, which is why I am wearing my comfy little coat during this broadcast because we're in the thirties here in Michigan, but other than that, good. How are you doing today?

Michelle Kane (00:37):

I am doing well. We are not quite that chilly here in the Philly burbs, but there's that beautiful fall crispness in the air that even though I'm not thrilled about the temperature plunges to come, I will take it. It adds a little snap to or step.

Karen Swim, APR (00:56):

We're just going to call this fall crisp with a little bit of rain. That's what we're going to call it. We're going to call it fall crisp because it's still technically fall, and I am determined to enjoy fall until the very last day. I refuse to accept that it's over because it's not technical.

Michelle Kane (01:18):

No, no. In fact, I saw a hysterical Instagram reel from Michelle Stafford. She's a soap actress, Nina General Hospital, everyone. But the whole point of the reel was that her young son was very disturbed that we were skipping Thanksgiving. We were hopping right from Halloween to Christmas, and you hear him in the backseat of her car going, “Where's Thanksgiving?” And so they go to Home Goods and they're shopping around and they found fall on a clearance table and the little boy says, “The boss here mustn't do Thanksgiving.”

Karen Swim, APR (01:59):

That is adorable and so sad. Help the children do not just push you all to the side. Do not push Thanksgiving away. I mean, listen, no matter what you feel about the pilgrims. Let's not rush it to Christmas.

Michelle Kane (02:15):

No, let's let our Thanksgiving meal digest properly. We don't want to get acid reflux as we hurl into the holidays. But she did end up buying some holiday items and she said, “I'm not proud.” And he goes, “I'm not proud either.” So check out Michelle Stafford's Instagram. It's very funny and not that we want to rush things, but speaking of social media and how fun it can be and how it can still be effective today, we're going to go on a little bit about social media planning for 2024. It's been a while since we stopped to sort of take stock and see what's going on out there. Where are our clients' audiences spending their time, what is still worth our time to use it as organizations and corporations? So we're going to talk about that a little bit.

Karen Swim, APR (03:09):

Yeah, honestly, Michelle, it's amazing to me that in this past 10 months how dramatically the social media landscape has changed, and maybe it's just me, but I feel like the changes have been as rapid as when social media really started to take off many, many years ago. I've not seen this dramatic of a shift in such a short period of time, all driven of course by the social media site formerly known as Twitter. It really just led to a deluge of changes and it's definitely well worth it to take a hard look at strategies and understand audit for your audiences again and make decisions about how you advise your clients or how you as a brand advise your company on what to do in the coming year.

Michelle Kane (04:07):

Yeah, that's so true, especially with regard to that channel. I know many have full on abandoned it for very good reasons because just of who has the hate speech and the things that have been allowed to take place. I mean, I still do find it a fair resource for journalists that are still hanging in there and trying to, it's for better or for worse, still a place where you might find up-to-date information. With yesterday being election day, it certainly wasn't like the good old days, but I thought, oh, okay, I can still get up to the moment information. But for the rest of it, if I were advising a client, a fresh new client today about using it, I would not, because it's almost like when you take your clients to lunch, do you want to take them to a nice place or a place with questionable actors?

Karen Swim, APR (05:01):

Yeah, it's really, I thought in all of the movement and all of the things that have happened on X this year, I was certain at some points that it would be gone by now. I really thought it would be gone or that it would have lost every shred of usefulness. Now, for some people, it really has. The interesting thing to me is that there were some media companies that made a wholesale decision that we refuse to be on this platform and support the ethics and the morals that are coming from the top, from the leadership and the tone and the environment and how it is has just become a bastion of not only hate speech but mis- and disinformation.

But I have found, as you said, that there are still many journalists who continue to use the platform. So for communicators, it is probably worthwhile depending on the reporters that you interact with, to at least keep your eye on your reporters there. It doesn't mean that you have to spend time on the platform. Definitely doesn't mean that you have to buy a blue check mark, none of those things, but as long as you have free access to the platform, there are journalists that very much engage there, which is helpful for our work, for my own clients across the board, many of them use it, but it's more of a broadcast channel. They just broadcast stuff out.

Some of them have, many people have penned posts that have a post, and then it talks about the other places that you can find them, but they just use it as a broadcast channel, not as an interactive channel. I think the other thing though, and Michelle, I'd love to hear your take on this, is that it feels like the tone of all of the channels has changed. So at one point where you had multiple channels for quote unquote business, I feel like there are some channels have become much more personalized. For me, Threads is not really a business channel. I see where it could be, but it really feels more of a take off your blazer, sit down and really connect with people around personal interest and your personal branding. Whereas LinkedIn has risen from the ashes in some ways to become the de facto business channel that all of my clients care about. That's where they're spending their money. Are you seeing the same thing?

Michelle Kane (07:43):

Yes. And I wonder if that's because Threads feels more like a, or is a derivative of Instagram or it's more aligned with Instagram. Now I have clients who use Instagram of course, being the retail facing the public facing. But even so there's a different vibe and a tone on Instagram. It's always been more casual. It feels unnatural if you're scrolling through your feed of Instagram and something very formal comes in. No, so that makes sense. And it is nice to see LinkedIn swaying away from what felt like a, I don't know, like a stilted Facebook light or something. I was like, no, no, no, I don't come here for this. I come here for business information to get to know colleagues better, of course. But to stay in that professional lane I think is a good thing that that is happening there.

Karen Swim, APR (08:42):

And algorithmic changes are also impacting the work that we do. So it has become more challenging because even if your audience is there, you're not guaranteed to reach them organically. So I think as we really evaluate how to advise clients in the coming year, we really want to make sure that we have a seat at the table to talk about those paid models as well. What's the budget for paid in the coming year? And make some recommendations about slices of the pie and how that should be allocated to some PR efforts as well. Don't leave yourself out of that paid discussion because there are things that as PR professionals, and I just had this discussion with a client yesterday where we want to use every slice, every piece of the pie, including paid. So we're making recommendations on that budget as well. So don't forget to do that because as you said, Instagram still remains as of today a channel where brands can engage, especially with consumer facing, brands can engage their audiences and get their attention, but you obviously can't be all buttoned up. It has to be visually appealing, you have to share information. So far it seems like people are still using influencers, although there's sort of a shift away from that word and the influencers, and then the Instagram algorithm has changed. It's made it harder to view people and they keep changing. So I mean these all factor into our decisions of where do we tell our clients to spend their time and research? If you're b2b, it's LinkedIn and you can pretty much close your eyes to everything else if you choose to.

Michelle Kane (10:35):

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, and even from the beginning of using social media for business, I've always advised clients to be discerning, you don't have to be everywhere. Just make sure that way you are, you're doing it as best you can with what you have. And that's different things to different people. And there are some clients where I can just say, again, thinking more of the consumer facing look, if your budget is X and you just have one special you want to put out on Facebook, then fine. We put a fair chunk of money that makes sense behind that and make sure the people that you want to see it, see it. Even though certainly Facebook ad buying has changed so much and it's definitely not as targeted as it used to be. You can still get there. But I think the bottom line too is if you want to be seen, you have to pay you

Karen Swim, APR (11:28):

So true. And so then drives into having those hard conversations with your clients about their ethical considerations as well. Because let's face it, a lot of people left Facebook in droves because there are concerns around privacy, their concerns about the company's ethics, the missile and disinformation, understandable. I am not going to slam anybody for making those decisions. Many people left X for the same exact reason, and Facebook, Instagram and threads are also meta. It's the same company. So again, we're left with view choices. I know that there are many other emerging apps like Blue Sky and Spill,

But again, what's happened is that this is so divided. Our publics, they're not en masse in one place anymore as it was in the past. And then you also as a company have to make these decisions about what really is right for your business. Where are the right places to show up and who do you really want to spend money with? For me, this brings home the point that we, communicators marketers have always said from day one, do not put all of your eggs into a basket that is owned by somebody else. This is why your websites, your email marketing strategies still need to be strong and you need to be driving place people to your home rather than always hosting at somebody else's house basically.

Michelle Kane (13:11):

I say that all the time, and I think even more so these days. Social media is certainly a capable tool for some things, but it's not as much in the forefront as it used to be. I encourage all of us to think about our clients and the way that we're helping them get known and get seen and get their stories told is to just rethink all of that. Because what is the main thing we're trying to do? We're trying to get their stories told. And that could be a literal story or it could be your oil change special of the month. Where can that be seen? And that's not always primarily social media. I think. I mean, I know my clients, a lot of companies do use their email marketing in a robust way, but I think there are also a fair amount of companies out there who are not using it in the way they used to. And I could venture to guess why is it because so many of us when we receive the emails, we're like, ah, delete, delete, delete, delete. But that's okay. I mean, again, I say this all the time to my clients. Your perfect ideal customer has to be ready for you to engage. So you may hit them with a message 20 times and the 21st time is the time that particular person is ready. The beautiful thing is there are so many people out there that you're talking to. It's,

Karen Swim, APR (14:52):

It's funny that you said that because for me, I'm one of those people who email is, it's just a constant annoyance as it is for everyone in the communication industry. And for many of us who lit our work is integrally tied to email as a communication channel. But I was having a conversation with somebody that I know the other day who was checking their email and he was like, oh, I have eight emails and just in the past, that's your 10 minute volume, right? It's like eight. And he was actually excited about getting an email from a brand that he had bought from and really liked the product and was excited to get the email about the sell. So again, I think you're right, Michelle, that we have to remember to that what we're sick of and what seems so commonplace to us, because it's our job from Inside View, we have to really put ourselves in the shoes of our public and understand maybe they're not overwhelmed with emails because that's not part of their day-to-day job, and they're not getting 22,000 emails in their inbox. Maybe they have five and maybe they're really happy to receive information from brands that they support, that they learn from. And so don't shy away from a toll just because in your mind you're over it, you're sick of it because not everybody is in that same space.

Michelle Kane (16:29):

We have to check ourselves and our jaded notions. And also too, I mean, hey, if check read industry blogs and make sure, because every once in a while, say maybe a couple times a year, I check and say, okay, is email still a very good tried and true way? And sure enough, it is.

Karen Swim, APR (16:55):

I think it's also important for brands to going into 2024 to be realistic not only in where you are on a social media platform, but what your goal is there. Because for so many years in the early days, we talked about community, community engagement, engagement, engagement. It's all about building a community. Can we be really honest? You're not going to build community around your toilet paper. You're just a topic that is really going to draw people that are so passionate about your brand of toilet paper that it's going to form a community. But is it to continue to keep your brand name in front of people as they're making buying decisions? Are there other things that you can expand into as a brand? Are there things that you support? So if you're a toilet paper brand, and can you remind people about prostate screenings? Are there things that are adjacent that you can share information about? I, so I think it's very important to re-look at your strategy, and sometimes PR professionals are not managing the day-to-Day social media, but we can at least educate and collaborate on the content that's going forward to help those teams to think about why are you really here and what are the goals and what are the expectations? Because the strategies really have changed. In my mind, they have, it's not because the tools have changed. And so I think it is important to take a fresh look at it as I'm sure that we're doing every year, but I feel like this year is more important than ever, and keeping in mind that we are entering election year, so that means a lot of noise. It means a lot of mis- and mal- and disinformation. Let's just face it. On top of the studies, there was a Pew study that just showed that people are turning away from the news in droves in that demographic, particularly of 30 to 49 years old. So if your publics factor into that, that's another thing that you need to weigh as a professional. Not that, oh my God, no one's paying attention, so we shouldn't do earned media. But what's the most effective way to leverage earned media to reach an audience that's become quite jaded about anything that comes out of a news organization?

Michelle Kane (19:26):

Yeah, and I love that you bring up the toilet paper idea of prostate cancer screenings. I mean, that really answers just the core. What's going to grab someone that they core or before they can outthink it of, oh, right, my health, how to make my day better, how to make my life better, how can I save money? Those kinds of narratives that really help someone in their day to day I think is a great place to focus on as we move into 2024. How can you be, not a partner, but just a key connection in someone's life, which is not quite the same as like you said at the outside of social. It's like, let's build a community. We thought that might happen, and then we realized what,

Karen Swim, APR (20:21):

Yeah, nobody's rallying it. I got an email today from Hiscock Insurance, shout out to Hiscock, which many of our solos utilize, and there was an article in their newsletter about reducing business expenses. And I clicked right through and I read that entire article. And again, this is somebody that provides insurance, but this was, they're in the business of supporting business owners. And everything in the newsletter was really helpful, but this was a topic that immediately caught my eye because we're all looking for ways to stretch our dollars as business people with everything going up so high. This was so timely, and it's smart. I don't get a ton of emails from them, but it was one that as I'm going through my 1700 emails, I actually did click through. I read this article, I remembered it, and now I'm talking about them on the podcast here. So don't diminish the value of showing up where people live on your, it's your list. No one can take that away from you using the things that you really do own and have a little bit more control of. And then maybe using social media as a way to amplify or to further drive people to your own properties.

Michelle Kane (21:41):

Exactly. I mean, I think that continues to be the name of the game, and I think sometimes we can move away from that. We can drift, but I think honing back on that and really telling what's your story, what do you need people to know and being helpful is still the way to go. So while we hope that we've been of help to you today with this bit of content that we are amplifying through our channels, and we hope that if it is helpful that you amplify it through your channels, please do share this around. We would really, really appreciate that. And if you have any suggestions or feedback, hit us up at solopro.com. And until next time, thank you for joining us on That Solo Life.