Year of the Tiger…What Else?

February 14^th was more than just the hallmark holiday of love this year.  This was also the date of the Chinese New Year.  Seeing as it’s been sufficient time for those of us who rang in the New Year on January 1^st to give up our resolutions, let’s take a minute and look at what marketers expect this year to bring outside of the Chinese Tiger. It’s been said that this is the “Year of Social Marketing”.  2009 was likely categorized as the year of the “Tweet” or the year that Facebook really blew up.  2009 was the year that social media started touching everyone, will 2010 be the year it starts affecting everyone?  Most say yes. 

You might be familiar with a little sporting event a couple weeks back called the SuperBowl.  Although we weren’t entirely let down by my personal favorite; the commercials, we were lacking one first stringer and it’s variety of pop culture co-stars.  Pepsi where were you?    Although Pepsi realizes the effectiveness of a Super bowl Campaign, they stated; “In 2010, each of our beverage brands has a strategy and marketing platform that will be less about a singular event and more about a movement.”  They are now moving those dollars to a social media platform to help develop relationships with their customers, not just display that Britney Spears enjoys their fizzy drink and can sing catchy tunes in their commercials.  Will others follow suit this year?  I expect so. 

So what areas might be of growth or focus this year?  Per my research, most marketers point to various common themes; mobile being a large player.  If you don’t already you’ll soon carry all the internet access you’ll need each day in your pocket.  This needs to be capitalized on better, it’s time.   Social media platforms will start to blend.  With the recent Buzz and Wave products, It  won’t be a surprise if we see the first social media hybrid come from Google.  As the brands start blending it will also be important for businesses to make their social marketing stamp - many are already doing a great job of this, think companies known for their twitter deal of the day.  Social marketers will also focus reaching the market that needs to be reached right now….mainly, women. 

Although most experts agree with this at least being “A” year, if not “THE” year of social marketing, others find it difficult to decipher where social marketing begins and ends from an execution standpoint and from a forum perspective.  After all social marketing isn’t just limited to Twitter and Facebook.   As those that see the importance in the social marketing movement taking the reins, we’ll see innovation.  This being the biggest and most calculated trend to affect us in many years allows us to anticipate this movement to really roar in 2010’s year of the tiger.