The importance of Social Media for businesses today is huge. As one of the most cost-efficient digital marketing strategies out there, businesses must incorporate social media in their marketing efforts in order to achieve business success.

According to research conducted by Statista, worldwide users of social media are expected to reach approx. 2.95 billion by 2020. This statistic alone should prompt businesses to keep up with the latest in social media trends, as by doing so they will reap the monetary benefit from their efforts.

Businesses can prepare for social media success in 2018 by considering and implementing the following top 10 social media trends:

1. Chatbots

Provides instant connection to customers, which enhances the user experience.

2. Ephemeral Content

Including ephemeral content among social media channels encourages followers to take quick action to access content and encourages real-time engagement.

3. Video

The use of video content is not a new social media trend, but an important one that will continue to rise in importance for 2018.

4. Mobile-First Content

Given that so many people nowadays are utilizing their smartphones to access social media channels, it’s no surprise that a mobile first content approach in social media marketing is one of the top 10 social media trends to prepare for in 2018.

5. User-Generated Content

Reposting user-generated content is a social media trend on the rise for this year. This social media strategy works well for generating greater engagement and trust among audiences.

6. Social Advertising

Social media ad spending continues to rise at a rapid rate, due to how effective it is for businesses’ ROI. Social advertising is a social media trend that businesses will want to build on this year.

7. Social Listening Tools

Through the practice of keeping careful track of conversations on existing social media channels, companies can pick out particular words/phrases and leverage them to generate content to specific target audiences.

8. Instagram Stories

In 2018, businesses should prepare to utilize Instagram stories more, as this is one of the top social media trends for this year. The rate of engagement among users is very high and continues to rise over time.

9. Face Filters

Face filters are gaining popularity and we will see more of this among social media channels, like Snapchat. This social media trend will also be of benefit to advertisers.

10. Influencer Marketing

The use of influencer marketing will be a big social media trend for 2018. In order to utilize it effectively, businesses need to focus on relevance to their own industry, products, and target audiences.