The post 5 Trends for the Future of Social Media in 2020 first appeared on 24 fingers.

The post 5 Trends for the Future of Social Media in 2020 appeared first on 24 fingers.

Think of it this way, with the exception of those daredevil types who leave their Christmas shopping until 4pm on Christmas Eve (yes, we did mean you Miss Goode), many of us will start thinking about Christmas once the Halloween cobwebs have been dusted away. And with Facebook saying that nearly half of shoppers start their Christmas shopping in November or earlier, if you start to deck your platforms with your Christmas social media campaigns in the next few weeks, you’ll be the early bird that catches the pig in a blanket. Use the following tips and tricks, and we promise you won’t be disappointed come Christmas morning.

On the First Day of Christmas, Facebook gave to me: Customisable Stories Templates!

Stories have risen quicker than a Christmas pudding this year, and it’s therefore easy to see why Facebook have given us an early Christmas present of new templates which allow businesses to provide simple but visually impactful Stories. These can be used across Facebook Stories, Messenger Stories and, the home of the original Story, Instagram Stories.

If you’ve never used Stories before, first of all, you need to come along to our training workshop. Secondly, these templates could be a really great place to start, especially if you’re looking to up your social media game this Christmas. If you want to access these templates, you’ll need to create an image ad in Facebook Ads Manager, then choose ‘Select a placement to customize’, before choosing which platform you’re posting to. From here a pop up will open, which will allow you to choose your template and preview your ad before posting.

You’ll find a whole host of new toys to play with in your Stories stocking from this point, including being able to choose the background colour, music and call to action effects. You will need to use them within paid promotions, but if you’ve never delved into the world of sponsored Facebook posts, is there a better time to try than in the run up to Christmas? Remember that you can also download these stories to re-use them as organic story posts at a later date. Shout us if you need a hand on this.

Christmas Consistency

Following on from the use of the new Facebook templates, whether you opt to use the pre-made templates or not, keeping your brand’s social media message consistent is key. Of course, you can add a little festive twist to your message, but make sure it’s in keeping with your overall brand look and feel. This could be keeping your colours or font choices the same as your usual posts but changing things up with Christmas imagery or using seasonal gifs and music.

Remember that your profile pictures and cover photos are prime social media real estate, so consider updating these with something merry and bright. Why not include some useful information in your cover photos too, such as your operating hours over the Christmas holidays?

Ho, Ho, Hashtags

Hashtags are important at any time of year, but Christmas – and specifically the run up to Christmas – generates more opportunities than ever to use them. First of all, why not come up with your own hashtag to go along with your Christmas campaign? This could be an excellent way of generating User Generated Content (UGC) which you can then use to repost your followers’ posts to your own pages.

Secondly, don’t just focus on the main festive season; think about the run up and use relevant hashtags such as #BlackFriday and #CyberMonday to drive traffic to your platforms.

Give the Gift of your Products

Of course, the main aim of any marketing campaign – Christmas related or otherwise – is to sell. And if you have gift-worthy products at your disposal, now is the time when you should be pushing them as Christmas presents.

Think about what products in your inventory work as Christmas gifts; some things will not lend themselves well as gifts, but maybe you do have products or services which people would want to give and receive. If so, those are the products that you should be highlighting right now.

Spread Good Cheer

Last but definitely not least, when it comes to your Christmas social media campaigns, remember that it’s ‘social’ media for a reason: spread good cheer, add a little festive fun to your posts and remember to engage with your followers.

Use the likes of polls in your stories to gather festive feedback from your followers or ask Christmas related questions and – most importantly – get excited about their responses. The more you engage with your audience in the run up to Christmas, the more they’ll see the human side of your brand, and isn’t the festive season all about goodwill to all men and women kind?

Still worried you’re going to make a right turkey of your Christmas social media campaign? Get in touch with 24 fingers. When it comes to social media, we’ll sort your Twitter from your tinsel, your Facebook from your frankincense, and we’re not just for Christmas either.

The post Top Tips for Planning your Christmas Social Media Campaigns first appeared on 24 fingers.

The post Top Tips for Planning your Christmas Social Media Campaigns appeared first on 24 fingers.

The post The Day the Internet broke first appeared on 24 fingers.

The post The Day the Internet broke appeared first on 24 fingers.

Striking the right balance between personality, professionalism, individuality and comedic effect is something of an art form. One, however, that anyone, anywhere, can master….

Short and Sweet

Your social media bio isn’t a rambling chapter of your autobiography. It’s a brief introduction, or snapshot, into you as a person. At the risk of sounding existential — Who are you? What do you do? What do you love?

Concise and to the point is KEY on social media. Your bio should represent the most important info that someone should know about you, straight away. Just as Ellen wants you to know that she’s an ice road trucker (amongst other things).

To help, try approaching your bio as you would a snappy headline; think your very own sensationalized news article. In other words (pun intended), get straight to the story.

Flatter Yourself

This is usually frowned upon, but not in the case of a social media bio, oh no. Now is the time to drop in that award you won, mention your most extraordinary skills, the projects that you’ve been a part – generally butter yourself up.

Set yourself apart from all the other professionals in your field and highlight your proudest accomplishments. There’s absolutely no harm in a little bit of self-promotion. Social media is one of the best platforms to expand your network, after all.

Be Uniquely You

Whether you’re writing your Instagram, Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn bio, remember: there is only one *insert your first and last name* in this world.

In the age of social media, your bio has become as, if not more, important as your business card. It’s your golden opportunity to convince people to ‘Friend’ you or Follow you, and one of the best ways to do that is to be completely, unapologetically you.

With 400 million plus active users on just Twitter alone, many bios are hopelessly predictable. Yours needs to be a breath of fresh air.

Know Your Target Audience

Did you know you can attract folk to your social media page with hashtags, handles and links? Yes, it’s completely possible.

On Twitter, specifically, you can @ the company work for or own (if you’re writing a bio on your personal profile), your university and other relevant networks. Throw in some searchable, trending hashtags that display your passions – #heforshe #foodie, if you’re a gender equality advocate and burger enthusiast.

Use words that help to specify your niche: blogger, vlogger, designer, politician, artist, author.

Targeting is simple yet very, very effective.

Have a Bit of Fun

There’s a comedian in all of us, waiting to be unleashed. Got a clever punchline you think would stop people in their tracks, wishing they came up with it themselves? Or a pun that’s so bad it’s almost great? Throw it in.Your bio is there to be professional but never be afraid to show off your personality.

Need a helping hand in summing up all those superlatives in one neat bio? Just pop your email in the form below and we’ll have you up and out there in no time.

The post 5 Key Ingredients of a Great Social Media Bio first appeared on 24 fingers.

The post 5 Key Ingredients of a Great Social Media Bio appeared first on 24 fingers.

Better read on find out, hey?

Putting a Face to a Name

Social media giant Facebook is taking yet another gargantuan sprint forward in the tech race – new super powers (AKA algorithms) that would help put names on faces, even if they are completely obscured.

This super savvy feature will include facial recognition, identifying people based on their clothing and even their posture. In a statement issued by the company, the feature has the ability to “recognise the entire population of Earth”. Impressive. Also a bit creepy.

In addition, Facebook is rumoured to be rolling out advanced technology that will use pictures to sell people products based on the info provided. For example, if a user posts a photo of them hiking the Andes mountains, the tech can recognise this and strategically place adverts for waterproof boots on their Facebook page.

It seems there’s no stopping the Zuck…

Pinterest Gets Snappy

Web and mobile app Pinterest have only gone and stepped up their game, once again. With plans to make it easier for users to search and discover favourite pins, the site has now added the ‘Lens’ feature to its landing page – a search and visual discovery tool.

If you spot something out in the world that immediately catches your eye (a swaggy pair of shoes, even cinnamon sticks if they strike your fancy), you can tap open the Lens camera on Pinterest, snap a photo and find related #inspo in an instant.

This comes after research conducted by the social network suggested “monthly mobile text searches are up by 40 percent year-over-year, with that figure climbing to 60 percent for visual searches”, prompting the move to shift the Lens feature as the site’s main focal point.

Time to get snap-happy!

Google+ Goes Under the Knife

Google+ is not about to left behind in the quest for world-wide social media domination. Keeping up with their competitors, the site underwent a couple of cosmetic changes, introducing a swanky update to their search bar.

Things like ‘Popular Topics’ are now displayed, as well as a list of your most recent searches. On top of that, users can now filter searches by Posts, Communities, Collections and People & Pages, all thanks to a brand new tabbed interface.

All these features are currently being rolled out to Google+ users far and wide.

Searching the WWW doesn’t get much slicker.

The post Facebook’s 20/20 Vision first appeared on 24 fingers.

The post Facebook’s 20/20 Vision appeared first on 24 fingers.

Like an onion reaching social media stardom, a feisty emoji petition and a KFC scented candle going viral for all the wrong reasons. Don’t believe us? You’ll just have to read on…

Potty Mouth

This past Wednesday will probably go down as the funniest glitch in Twitter history.

A number of users noticed that when you searched “asshole”on Twitter, the first suggested result was none other than U.S. President Donald Trump.

The post Feeling Emojinal first appeared on 24 fingers.

The post Feeling Emojinal appeared first on 24 fingers.

After all, there’s nothing quite like an edition of #WINS and #FAILS to beat the pesky #JanuaryBlues….

Britain, we have a problem

There’s been a courgette crisis sweeping across the nation, and hundreds of Brits have turned to social media to do what they do best: complain.

As blizzard conditions have been taking a heavy toll on crops in southern Spain, shaken shoppers have expressed a sense of despair over low stocks and rocketing prices. And, as history has proven time and time again, with profound First World Problems comes Twitter mockery:

The post It’s Bond, Jane Bond first appeared on 24 fingers.

The post It’s Bond, Jane Bond appeared first on 24 fingers.

The post Marketing Campaigns That Will Put a Smile on Your Face first appeared on 24 fingers.

The post Marketing Campaigns That Will Put a Smile on Your Face appeared first on 24 fingers.

Hi ho, hi ho

It’s off to work we go. So on Tuesday the majority of the population went back to work. No one was sure what day it was, why they were up so early or what they were supposed to be doing in the office.

The struggle was real.

Bring on the weekend!

Keeping up with Kim, again

The queen of social took a three month hiatus from all social media platforms following the horrific Paris robbery back in October – but that still didn’t mean anyone forgot about her. We saw Kim Kardashian trending multiple times without any sign from the reality star herself, until now. On the 4th of January, she began sharing a series of personal pictures of her and her family across Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

There was no real explanation to her sudden reappearance, but fans were happy to see her and it looked like she was happy to be back too…

Horse Play

No, your eyes are not playing tricks on you. That is a horse leaning into a London bus.

On TfL reported that mounted police attended an emergency on Upper Street, Islington, which is when the accompanying horse tried to see if he could help.

Once people knew the person on board being treated was alright, hilarity ensued.

https://twitter.com/CharlesLawley/status/816364584588156929

Or to the Nag’s Head, perhaps?

Dippy is ducking out

Our beloved treasure, Dippy the Diplodocus dinosaur, will be leaving the Natural History Museum after a mammoth 112 years, to go on a final farewell tour before retiring.

People from far and wide took to Twitter to talk about the Jurassic star – some sad for his departure, others looking forward to seeing him closer to home in the near future.

Whilst he will be sorely missed, his space will be filled once again as he is replaced by a real skeleton of an 83ft (25.2m) female blue whale, weighing 4.5 tonnes. Wowsers.

Trivial Pursuit

This week also featured National Trivia Day, where we found out a whole lot of fascinating facts.

Maybe we should spend less time on YouTube?

Yikes! But of course, it wouldn’t be a trend on Twitter without a few jokes too…

We see what you did there.

The post New year, new tweets first appeared on 24 fingers.

The post New year, new tweets appeared first on 24 fingers.

As the curtains to this this action-packed year draw to a close, we revisit some of the heartwarming, brilliant, unexpected trends that took the Internet by storm.

Without further ado, here are our winning social media happenings of the year…

You’ve Got a Friend in Me

Everybody knows that cat clips rule the internet. So, when skincare brand La Roche-Posay released perhaps the most lovable video marketing campaign of the year, its resonating message didn’t go amiss:

The post When Social Media Sleighed first appeared on 24 fingers.

The post When Social Media Sleighed appeared first on 24 fingers.