While the media coverage and Big Data gurus broadly and excitedly speak of undeniable skyrocketing of social media let us not –as in a shell game have our focus misled. Truth is that a new trending movement raises yet another challenge for marketers, big and small in our digital world. True enough social media use, platforms like Facebook and Twitter, grow at enviable rates. Yet the reality is social activity shifts from public to private. Much of the growth comes from private social activity. More and savvier users are sending messages and multimedia directly to select individuals and custom groups of friends.
People are realizing they Do NOT want everything exposed publicly to the word for scrutiny and redistribution. More importantly people realize, at least for now using private messaging apps mean just that—privacy. They don’t want to be targeted and tracked. And guess what? For the most part marketers can’t monitor all their private message conversations.
A big question is as s private social activity chips away at public social activity how marketers will find a way to stay relevant with these nearly invisible audiences? Some social platforms are trending apps to meet this demand. Facebook Messenger was developed and is offered as a stand-alone app, Line- the free voicemail and free messaging app and China’s WeChat. In an illustration of an attempt to be relevant in private messaging activity BuzzFeed is in the infancy of a deal with WeChat to distribute content through this private social message platform. You can bet just as ads banners and tailored marketing messages now are accepted as the norm around your email boxes if the WeChat/BuzzFeed partnership is acceptable to private messaging users ad-based content will surely follow users of private social messaging.
