In a few days time we’ll see the end of the year and the end of the decade. It would be a good opportunity to have a look at how the Internet has changed, but it’s even more interesting to try to imagine how it will change in the future. For us, the next 10 years, the next decade, will be the Social Media decade. Here we give you Ten keys to the Social Media decade.
•    Social Media have become the buzz words of the last few years. Social Media will stop being buzz words and become the cornerstone of marketing. Company-client relationships have changed, the clients’ opinion and the influence they have over other clients will be more important than ever before. Companies will need to know who is saying what about them.
•    Social Media will stop being the private game reserve of a few expert users to become a real measure of personal and business relationships. Pyramidal relationships are out. Companies will have to treat clients as equals. It will be strange at first but companies will slowly but surely adapt to talking to their users.
•    It will no longer matter how many followers you have on Twitter, Facebook… What will really matter is the quality of relationships between people and companies. Now, more than ever before, contents and conversations will rule.
•    It will no longer be necessary to be a big company to have an advantage. Social Media will equalise strengths on the battle field. Talent, originality and creativity don’t need large budgets.
•    The world of marketing is continuously moving. It shouldn’t matter where or when, if you don’t adapt to mobile marketing you’re out of the game.
•    Clients will change their way of getting information about a brand or product. For that reason, Social Media will stop being a priority only for marketing departments. Those in charge of sales will also have to change their relationships with potential clients.
•    Marketing departments will see how the areas dedicated to Social Media and Search Engine Marketing grow considerably compared to traditional advertising and direct marketing, showing that the ROI of Social Media is more than guaranteed.
•    Social Multimedia. Blogs, photologs, podcasts or videoblogs will become things of the past. Interaction with users will be complete. Livestreamed and Real Time will be Social Media’s preferred food in the next decade.
•    All companies will have social websites. Clients will expect immediate replies from companies and the latter will take advantage of this to encourage satisfied clients to remain faithful to the brand. Companies’ priorities will be to get clients to talk about their brand, make it easy for them to share their experience, their purchases. To do this they must give them tools that are in keeping with the times.
•    Goodbye to hardware. Web-apps, direct downloads, e-books will put an end to traditional hardware. Paper, DVD’s and pen drives will become things of the past. As will market studies based on small random samples. Campaign results will be easier to measure thanks to analysis and monitoring tools.