social media

For Cinco de Mayo in 2016, Taco Bell struck marketing genius. The company leveraged popular social network Snapchat to allow users to turn their faces into giant taco shells. It was a hit and the campaign broke Snapchat records, achieving 224 million views in a single day. But it came at significant cost to the restaurant chain.

By this point in 2017, the use of social media is second nature to almost everyone. Posting on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and a slew of other media channels is as comfortable as sending emails. According to Statista, 81 percent of Americans have at least one social media profile.

Did you know that millennials constitute the largest living generation? Bet you never thought of them that that way — as a bigger cohort than even the Baby Boom generation. Perhaps now, no matter what line of business you are in, you should think of them as that: more influential as a subset of society than other groups and especially as consumers.

If you are paying attention to social media in earlier part of July, you might have heard some people chirping about Shark Week. Not just shark experts and oceanographers, but, well . . . everybody. Look up the hashtag #SharkWeek, or just take a spin through your social media and you will see Shark Week has people talking. 

Earlier this month, we mentioned social media as a part of the mix for brand-building ideas in 2015. By now, just about everyone you know has a Facebook page or Twitter account. And it’s pretty standard to find out about a breaking news story via social media. Chances are that, if you’re a busy person, you default to your phone first and might be reading news on mobile.

Moreover, think about the last time you got a recommendation on a good restaurant or wanted to check the game score for your favorite college football team. Did you end up on their Facebook page?