Social business trends are exciting and evolving, and these are a few to watch for in the latter half of the year.

Social business trends are constantly on the move. The field is quickly changing and there are new components emerging constantly. I was recently presenting at the Social Media Strategies Summit in New York on the concepts behind building a social business strategy for B2C brands. Hearing two full days of presentations shone some light on what some of the most popular social business trends are, and what marketers should be paying attention to in the second half of this year. According to a whole host of experts (the full summit agenda can be seen here) this is what is on the rise in the world of social business.

Welcome to the Age of Social Advertising

We have advocated social advertising for quite some time, but it has not been until recently that industry experts have really come around on the idea of ‘pay to play’. The social-media-is-free excuse is slowly disappearing, and people are starting to realize that in order to see ROI, there has to be an ‘I’ involved.

That ‘I’ (which, of course, stands for investment) has come in many forms – a lot of which was opportunity or sunk costs that most people tended to overlook – but is now clearer than ever: paid ads. Networks like Facebook have made no effort to hide the fact that brands are going to have to accept the ‘pay to play’ model – and why would they? Facebook has reached a critical mass of users and can effectively call the shots. Of course, there is a diplomatic way of doing things, so they slowly rolled it out over time.

The good news is that ads are still relatively inexpensive (we ran an internal case study for a competitive keyword set and found that Facebook can be upwards of ten times less expensive than AdWords) but that won’t last too long. As brands continue to see results and more companies jump on the advertising bandwagon, we can all expect to see those costs rise.

Mobile is Even More Important

It’s no secret that mobile is hugely important. We’ve watched the rise of this platform shoot past anything we’ve ever seen in this or, quite frankly, any other field. It might sound hard to believe, but mobile is becoming even more important.

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There is a 93% global penetration of mobile devices. 93%. Roughly a third of those users are using a smartphone. (Source) Apps and programs are being developed specifically for mobile, and networks like Twitter – roughly three quarters of whose userbase accesses the network via the mobile app – and Instagram are going completely mobile. Brands are looking for ways to leverage the popularity of the platform, and we can surely expect to see mobile campaigns, mobile friendly content and mobile advertising continue to skyrocket in the months to come.

Social Care is Penetrating New Markets

Everyone knows the story of Comcast’s success with social care – essentially, customer service through social media. The brand went from having some of the worst customer service ratings in the provider market to some of the best, all through the use of Twitter. That idea is starting to make it to new markets.

Moreso than ever before, brands of all industries are wondering how they can engage in some form of social care. Last year, Nielsen reported that a third of all online adults prefers to engage with a brand on social media rather than through conventional forms of customer service (including email). As that number has risen, so has the number of companies trying to leverage the popularity of this phenomenon. Positive customer experience (and tweeting about that experience) is an extremely valuable growth opportunity, and that is very capable of being done with social care.

Social Media and the Law

Perhaps the most hotly debated (and longest running) session at the summit took place around the idea of the implications of the law in the world of social media. It is a hugely interesting topic, simply because it is the first media of its kind and old laws have to been reinterpreted to apply to its use.

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Recently, a lawsuit was launched by a well-known actress against a well-known retail operation for the use of an image against her consent on Twitter. This is a groundbreaking suit as it really highlights that there are in fact legal implications to using social media – and not just the ones made up by employers and employees dealing with a ‘misunderstanding’. This is a field growing in importance, and we can surely expect to see it come to the forefront in the very near future.

Conclusion

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that there is so much taking place in the world of social media. These social business trends are only a few of the directions in which social will be heading this year (and in years to come). With such a quickly evolving market, it is sometimes difficult to keep track of the latest announcement or change. But these items should stay top of mind.

What major social business trends have you noticed this year? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!