When it comes to Public relations for a  company on social media platforms, one of the biggest players in the industry has been Instagram for a while now. In the last few years, Instagram has managed to grow and evolve at alarming rates, with a billion monthly active users, and 500 million users of the Instagram Stories feature alone. These are all people that are more than happy to engage with companies that generate a lot of engagement for the platform, and for businesses that promote themselves on it. According to research, there are many benefits that companies can get from promoting themselves on a platform such as Instagram, including reaching millions of people all over the world.

Not only that, but according to case studies, over 100.000 people have utilized the Instagram shopping feature each month, and they tend to use the platform early on in their buying journey. Around 80% of users on the platform follow at least one company profile, and over 70% of them have stated that they made a purchase after seeing something they liked on the platform. In general, it seems that users of the platform tend to be more than happy to follow companies, engage with them, and get recommendations on various solutions through the platform. Not only that, but Instagram as a platform has continued improving itself and investing in helping companies turn their engagement into actual sales and revenue by streamlining the sales process, creating advertising campaigns, adding links to generate website traffic, and more.

Due to the visual nature of the platform, Instagram has been able to attract users from a number of different countries all over the world. Many people on the platform enjoy interacting with companies, which means Instagram is a great place where companies can promote themselves, and generate more leads with the right strategies. One of the most effective tools that Instagram has introduced in terms of marketing efforts is Instagram Stories, which can allow companies to better define the customer experience.

Serialized content

Now would be the ideal time for brands to check out and test TikTok, according to Al Zaccaria, co-founder of Linktree, an Instagram bio link personalization platform. Zaccaria’s rationale is that many brands are still thinking about checking out this increasingly popular platform.

As of November 2019, TikTok had already exceeded 1.5 billion downloads, as per Sensor-Tower. The app analytics provider added that TikTok was ranked third in downloads and even beat Facebook and Instagram, which finished fourth and fifth to end the year.

While social media algorithms and trends are always changing, one thing still holds true: content is king. This means that brands must constantly revisit and update their content strategies to remain relevant in the online conversation. Even the smallest adjustments can keep consumers interested, bring in new followers and take advantage of the platforms’ ever changing algorithms.

Below are five ways to make sure your brand’s content is king.

The uphill climb that is obtaining genuine engagement on social media can quickly become tiresome for even the most seasoned marketing professionals. As social media platforms continuously make reaching customers organically more and more difficult, marketers must think on their feet a bit in order to stay ahead of the curve.

Gone are the days when each and every post put up by a business page was shown to all of the page’s followers. Gone are the days when businesses had no trouble gaining traction on social media, thanks to all of the tools available to improve the interactions between businesses and consumers.

Crises come and go, and many, like the pandemic, can’t even be foreseen. Nonetheless, those that seriously affect the brand, its employees, operations, and leadership can have devastating and long-lasting effects. The acceleration of social media has added to the challenges of crisis communications, an impact that a Pentland Analytics study says has doubled the impact on shareholder value.

The study also found that those companies that responded well saw an average increase in the value of 20% while those that didn’t experience a 30% decrease. In a world where today’s COVID-19 crisis is much bigger than the brand but can have a tremendous effect on its business and operations, it’s highly advisable and not too late to craft and employ a social media crisis management strategy.

Social media communications has changed the world.

Social media has not only changed the speed at which people can communicate, it has also changed what people say to each other as they fit it into as few characters as possible.

Does it seem that the stores are displaying holiday items earlier and earlier each year? The term “Christmas Creep” was first used in the mid-1980s to describe the merchandising of goods and decorations before the day after Thanksgiving which had heretofore been the traditional start of Christmas shopping. Since then, the term “holiday creep” also came into play to describe early sales for Halloween and Thanksgiving.

If your company still observes the day after Thanksgiving as the official start of the Christmas shopping season, here are some things you might consider as you plan your strategy for this year.