Social media is a very new aspect of our businesses that have taken over significant parts of not only our marketing plans but also our personal lives. Major platforms battle for prominence and significance by adjusting their business models to provide better returns for their shareholders while intending to improve the user experience. As these systems develop, how you use these platforms for your business must change as well. Here are 10 social media challenges to face in 2018:

1. Keeping pace with changing algorithms and platform innovations.

Organic reach is the elephant in the room, because of its direct impact on budgets, but there are changes, advancements and opportunities across the social media spectrum. Some of those changes can be key to a platform’s effectiveness for a particular brand.

2. The Unstoppable Rise of Video.

You already know the importance of video in your social strategy, but there is one common mistake many marketers are tripping up on – making video just for the sake of having video. Many marketers overthink their video content and end up wasting time producing something that falls flat with their audience. Video is still one of the biggest social media challenges, though there are many simple yet effective solutions. Keep it simple yet captivating. Remember to grab emotion with your video content and make the messaging relevant to your audience’s problem and how you can solve it. Brainstorm a few scenarios where you can go live on Facebook to showcase your culture (which is also great evergreen content). Encourage your employees to share your posts on their personal socials and share on-the-job photos when applicable.

3. Social Media Return-on-Investment Monitoring.

Short-sighted social media vanity metrics will no longer cut it in 2018. It is time to let go of follower counts and page likes and instead focus on factors like customer service expenditures, brand perception monitoring, talent acquisition, supply chain analysis, and reputation risk management. Developing a social outreach strategy focused on ROI monitoring will require brands improve their analytics measuring if they hope to achieve ongoing success.

4. Higher Engagement Rates Between Brands & Customers.

Brands are suddenly realizing the impact of social media engagement and creating lasting relationships instead of just treating social as a platform to advertise their products. It’s absolutely essential to keep your followers happy by providing a network where they can reach you. According to Instagram, at least 80% of its users already follow a brand on the network. Don’t leave your golden chances for communication behind. In 2018, it’s going to continue to be about making relationships and providing feedback when users need it the most from you.

5. Proving the ROI of strategies.

Even when implementation goes flawlessly, effective measurement of your success is crucial. New tactics employed to meet platform changes are especially important to evaluate.

With so many new features on each social platform, how are you supposed to know which ones you really need to spend time getting familiar with? Many smaller brands are growing weary of the influx of new updates. No one can blame anyone. Everybody loves it, but everyone should understand that it is hard to keep up with social trends when you’re not in the thick of it every day.