Social media marketing, or SMM, has dramatically progressed over the past few years. Its high popularity from the lockdown is tremendously hitting the Vibes market. On analyzing this scenario of marketing, some experienced marketers have called it the new wave of updation. But wait. The changing graphs, content posting, branding, or growing business via SMM are the parts of the updation. Is 2024 the updated version of Social media marketing? This needs deep research into the changing pattern and how social media marketers deal with it. 

So, let’s start from the beginning and examine how these shifts have affected businesses positively or negatively. 

The State of Social Media Marketing in 2020

In 2020, social media marketing will be all about making networks. These networks work for their growth, visibility, and an outstanding targeting process. Though Digital marketing has already established its footprint, many needed clarification to make a thin line gap between social media marketing and digital marketing. Things were covered only a few channels, and certain trends and practices also dominated the scenes. Such as,

 

 Platform Popularity:

• Facebook: is the top-ranked platform for social media marketing, with a massive user base and robust advertising tools. 
• Instagram: Rapidly growing with some visual content and, more importantly, unique content. 
• Twitter: Used for real-time engagement and customer service.
• LinkedIn: The go-to platform for B2B marketing, professional networking, and thought leadership.

Content Types:

• Static Posts and Images were more popular at that time.
• Video Content was gaining attention to rise up or almost covering the limelight.
• Influencer Collaboration mainly belongs to brands or high businesses, not to the MSMEs

 Advertising and Campaigns:

• Paid Advertising and campaigns are mainly meant for brands to target their audience. Though MSMEs also used the tools, the benefit was limited. Also, big-scale businesses tried to inform their audience about their services. 
• Analytics Tools: In 2020, social media marketers analyzed posted content or ads based on a few static parameters. Once the ad was optimized, the chances of targeting an interested audience increased.

Customer Interaction:

• Being a social media marketer, customer interaction is the first thing a client wants, and of course, at that time, the demand for this was the same. But there were influencers who had millions of followers, and the most popular ones were the most popular ones. Of course, at that time, too, their audience was their followers, but not purely shifting towards community building.
• Though social media marketing was rising, it was still a platform for custom support and feedback at that time.

The Evolution to 2024

Though social media marketing in 2020 is all about posting photos, videos, ads, and so many things somewhere, a fixed solution still has the quality of adaptiveness. Since the SMM was rising or in the middle of its journey, the people placed the content exactly as the audience wanted and remembered that the audience had covered a wide range. So, social media marketers are adapting widely to new cultures with future growth. 

Now when in the evolution of 2024, things were the same but with the modification bars such as,

Instagram: Earlier, it was gaining popularity, and now, too, it is popular, but mainly for short reels or content, with more rises as a shopping spot for MSMEs.

Facebook: Similarly, between 2020 and 2023, the graph of Facebook popularity was lying down, but again, in 2024, it was back on track. But now, it has risen as a community target audience. The major role of this community is huge, and we will definitely cover it later in this article. 

LinkedIn:- See, in 2024, the content is the main key, and all the big platforms very easily and wisely adopt this thing as LinkedIn was and is for the B2B business, but with some twist to promote the content for the creators and live streamers. 

 Content Types: Short-form videos are gaining attention on Instagram, while Facebook is experimenting with long-form videos that describe the reason behind what, how, and when. 

Live Streaming: The term was actually introduced by gamers, but yes, now many brands are using live streaming for product launches, Q&A, or real-time engagement. 

 User-generated content: In today’s age working on sensory marketing, yes, the content that catches more attention because of authenticity, trust, and an experience of the senses. 

. Working on funnel:-

In 2024, funnel marketing will be the biggest drastic change for social media marketers. Of course, it is a very tiring task. How? Let us clarify this.

The Client’s Behaviour: Earlier, the client was immature and had some patience to learn things accordingly, whether it was campaigning, Posting, gaining some numbers on your account, or many other things. But now, social media marketing has changed so much, and so have the scenarios. The client nowadays becomes impatient for growth to gain some numbers and campaigns. 

Rolling Marketing: Marketing has shifted. Now, it is all about performance. How many leads were you giving, the numbers, and the promises on that? So, it all started with the changing perception of the client, and that’s why social media marketing has been taking this shift. 

In 2024, the funnel works best for social media marketing, starting from the 1st step, i.e., Awareness, – Consideration – Conversion – Loyalty – Advocacy. This is what is trending now: to satisfy customer needs and create a balance between market competitions. In this funnel, the product is diversified and filtered by the audience in many ways. 

It needs to be understood that rather than having a fake crowd, you should just build your community. In the latest update, the Instagram algorithm has also clarified Nan influencers and their special marketing. Actually, creating a community means the audience is the targeted audience and the interested one, too. 

So, in 2024, the market is gaining its roots. This means social media marketing is now serious marketing. It is not fun to run ads or post without a perfect image of the result.      

Key Differences

Focusing on some special points of difference between social media marketing in 2020 and 2024 so, here is the list

1. Content Consumption:

• 2020: More focus on static posts and images.
• 2024: Focus on storytelling video content, including short-form, live, and experiences.

2. Platform Dynamics:

• 2020: Facebook was at the end of the rise, and Instagram was at the beginning of the rise.
• 2024: Facebook is gaining popularity for community building and long content, while Instagram is somehow in the phase of reels and short videos. 

3. Customer Engagement:

• 2020: Basic interaction through posts and comments.
• 2024: Sophisticated engagement through AI chatbots, live streams, and social commerce features. The AI especially helps to lay out fruitful results.

Conclusion

The transition from 2020 to 2024 is just like the twist and turn with some modifications in the basics. Yes, it is a very difficult task for social media marketers, Especially with impatient clients. The platforms are being modified daily, and news is being adopted on social media. However, the one thing going somewhere is the quality of content and the eagerness for adaptive behavior. 

The AI is here now to channel the content with different scenarios but wait, at the end of the day, AI helps to make your work easy, but it is you who completes that work. The technologies, algorithms, working, primary steps, strategies, and everything will be updated with some new touch of advancement. Businesses that have to adopt this culture and understand the value of each step are great; otherwise, the last call of success will ring their doorbell, too. 

The only thing that works like Wonder is funnel marketing. However, it depends on how you create and use that funnel.