5 Social Media Trends to Watch Right Now

July 6, 2010: summarized from Mashable.com -- With social media itself an exponentially growing trend that’s here to stay, many companies both small and large are keeping tabs on new social technologies as they emerge. With new sites, services, apps and practices that help businesses connect more directly with customers coming online at a rapid pace, it’s often helpful to zoom out a bit and keep an eye on upcoming trends on the cusp or just over the horizon.

Whether or not particular individual services succeed, the following trends are likely to stick around in the near-term future. Some may not be immediately relevant to your company or industry, but being aware of oncoming movements in the social media landscape can help keep you and your business out ahead of the curve when a new trend holds promise for your organization’s growth.

1. Location, Location, Location
From Foursquare to Gowalla - it’s all the rage: sharing where you are, where you’re going, where you’ve been – and being able to tell it to your friends…mobilecasting? Competition amongst mobile brands vying for "location mindshare" is heating up. "Checking in" has become second nature, and part of the parlance. Twitter now enables local information to be attached to tweets. Google Latitude lets you update your location automatically in conjunction with privacy settings. Facebook will soon follow suit. And as a marketing opportunity, geolocation is good news for brands of all sizes.

2. Group Buying
Top two sites, Groupon and Living Social, have helped spur consumers to band together to leverage bigger deals and deeper discounts in specific cities. Depending on the number of users who sign on for that day’s deals, everybody can benefit from the offer. But if too few sign up, nobody gets the deal. The local factor plays a key role here and daily deals are an alternate way to reach new customers. Social media as economic leverage?

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