Social Media

Following social media trends with hopes to hit big with content

If you’ve been on the internet long enough then you have seen time and time again there have been instances where an individual or a brand’s content has been reposted across the internet. In some of these instances the owner of the content is credited or they aren’t and there is no mention of the original creator in the “resharing” of the content. As the trend of reposts has continued to grow, audiences and fans of original creators have now begun to demand those who reposts to provide credit to the original creator.

Although we could go on about reposts, one thing that has caught our curiosity is the act of creating the same content with either your own twist to it or doing the exact same thing as the original creator. This trend started with challenges on TikTok where users are encouraged to try out something fun and make a video of it to add to the many of other videos of people doing the same thing under that particular challenge.

As creators, users, and brands are all trying to leave their mark in the social space and grow their followers and audience, creating replicated content can set you back in your own branding if not done correctly. If you’re analyzing your content strategy and doing research on what you should create you should take these pre-planning questions into consideration when coming up with your social content strategy.

• Who am I trying to target?
• Is replicating content going to grow my audience?
• Does this content align with my already established brand?
• Is this organic and relatable to my audience?

Know your target and grow that audience

If you are new to the marketing business side of content then you may have just been creating content that you’ve enjoyed without a clear view of who you wanted to target to reach established goals for your platform. There are plenty of trends and challenges to choose from to replicate, but it is important to know if your target audience is interested in a particular trend and if they will respond to it.

For example, if you are managing content for a home décor brand it is very unlikely that your audience will be interested in watching a video of someone doing the “Move move shake shake now drop” challenge created by the dance couple Cost n’ Mayor if all you have ever posted is pictures of your furniture.

Creating something similar would be out of the norm for your brand and not practical if you aren’t interested in creating consistent content following creating that one video. The video could be really successful and gain you followers, but they followed you for that one video and now see that it was a one and done and therefore you could potentially lose new followers due to your failure to keep them engaged. We see this a lot with a lot of accounts that have a viral video with zero similar content on their account and therefore only have one successful video with the same number of followers they started with.

It is important to go viral to for your target audience.

Create relatable content

Great content strategists are able to think out of the box, especially when it comes to online trends. Discover how a trend can relate to your brand. If your online brand focuses on cooking then it would not be ideal to hop on the Chipotle catering trend where users are using Chipotle catering orders to meal prep for the week. Your Chipotle dupe meal doesn’t align with the initial challenge which focuses on users not wanting to cook for themselves, but instead looking for a way to make meal prep much easier for them using food someone else cooked.

If you are a brand that offers catering options that could also provide an opportunity to meal prep and believe your food to be better than Chipotle, then this would be a trend you would be interested in creating content for. Following a trend that still lets your content to be relatable to your audience will help you gain engagement from your current audience and also build onto your audience creating similar content to a trending topic that has spread across multiple social channels.

Show up in the midst of all of the noise

As others follow and create content for a particular trend it is best to be quick with hopping on a trend so your content doesn’t get lost in the masses. Look into creative ways to involve those who are creating these trends by investing in influencer marketing. Even consider challenging yourself by starting your own trend.

There are many ways to participate in trends online, but still keep your brand intact. We are happy to help your brand increase your followers while also increasing your engagement on and off social media. Let us help you discover a content strategy that works for you and your brand. Chat with us today.