You heard it here. Social Media is evolving and for communication and HR professionals, there’s plenty of opportunity to go around. According to a report by Annual Reviews, smart businesses are using social media to communicate with internal and external stakeholders, to reach potential candidates, engage with customers and more. Here are five potential ways social media could change for the better in 2024:
- Recruiting: Some social media platforms will increasingly use AI algorithms to match job seekers with organizations. According to HR.com, AI can help streamline the hiring process and make it more efficient and effective for HR by pre-screening candidates, among other useful tasks.
- Engaging with customers: Social media platforms are introducing more interactive features (like chatbots) to encourage personalized communication within your company so you can easily connect with your customers and form a relationship with them.
- Connecting a remote workforce: Although there has been a recent shift to bring employees back into the office, according to Forbes Advisor, 28 percent of employees worked a hybrid model in 2023 and it’s projected by 2025, 32.6 million Americans will work remote. As a result, employees will rely on social media to work with colleagues in different locations using features such as project management, virtual meeting spaces, and real-time document collaboration. We will also see an increase in value to having strong mobile apps, instant messaging apps, employee social network platforms in a remote or hybrid working environment. Our clients like these social networks best: MS Viva Engage (formerly Yammer), talkspirit, happeo, workplace from Meta, and expect big things from these platforms in the future.
- Employee feedback: Use of social media to engage and communicate to internal stakeholders is nothing new for communications pros looking to use social media platforms to secure real-time employee feedback. But companies like TINYpulse, Officevibe, and ContactMonkey are improving their digital tools that collect insights on employee satisfaction, engagement, and concerns, enabling quicker responses to any issues that may pop up. And if you haven’t used these tools for stakeholder surveys, pulse checks, etc. you may be missing out.
- Professional development and training: Social media platforms are evolving to become one of the top sources of professional development and training. Organizations are using platforms like YouTube to host training videos, LinkedIn to network and share training content, Instagram for visual storytelling, and many other external and internal social media platforms to provide employees with access to relevant training.
These emerging trends in social media can present an advantage when it comes to strategic marketing, talent management, employee engagement, and organizational development. Keeping an eye on the trends and these social media pioneers for new tools, enhancements and functionality is smart business.
By: Jennifer Bohmueller