The butterfly effect.
In chaos theory, the butterfly effect is the concept that small changes to initial conditions can have large effects on a later state. Every little change can have huge consequences later. A butterfly flaps its wings and it starts to rain halfway around the world.
This is why it’s important to have control of these initial conditions and make use of predictive analytics to choose the best strategy.
Digital media, especially social networks, give businesses a golden opportunity to make personal connections with customers, solve their problems, and turn them into passionate advocates for their brand.
But are these really worth your time?
Small business owners are eager to embrace social media, but their schedules often get in the way. SBOs have to wear many hats: they have to manage the day-to-day operations, the finances, promoting their business, etc. Just the sheer volume of social media platforms can make choosing one intimidating, let alone managing and generating consistent and quality content. Let us help you with some predictive analytics.
2017 digital marketing predictions
We’ve compiled some of the most interesting digital media predictions for 2017 made by Scott Galloway, brand strategy and digital marketing professor at NYU Stern School of Business, and Maureen Mullen, Chief Strategy Officer and Co-Founder of L2, a business firm that benchmarks digital performance.
Scott and Maureen give us their predictions on Amazon, Snapchat, and Apple, but this time we want to focus on their predictions for Google, Facebook, and Instagram.
The winner-takes-all market of digital media and marketing
The whole concept of the winner-takes-all is more alive and true than ever. If you take a look at what happened during the first half of 2016, Google took 60% of the growth of all digital advertising media in the U.S. Facebook was second with 43%.
How is that possible? Those percentages amount to 103%! Well, just like that, every other digital advertiser collectively dropped 3%
Even more interesting: take into consideration that the average time spent per day on a mobile phone is increasingly shifting from mobile web to in-app usage, and that Google has dropped the rates that they charge by 11%, yet they are still seeing their ad revenues go up considerably.
“If you’re not working with Google and Facebook, and you’re in digital media, it means you’re in a declining business.” – Scott Galloway
As you can see, Google continues to dominate digital advertising and will not be going anywhere any time soon.
Instagram will become the new facebook
Don’t get me wrong, Facebook is still an incredible business, and their interaction rate is amazing, but their November 2016 Earnings Release points to a declining trend in their average interactions per post. That being said, they still have what is probably the most powerful platform out there, Instagram.
Instagram had 92% of all social engagement during the last quarter of 2016. Facebook was second with 7%, and Twitter came in last with 1%.
Instagram is becoming the new Facebook, and we’ll see the monetization of Instagram in full throttle during 2017.
The real impact of the butterfly effect in digital media
A man gives money to two girls and people have a feast halfway around the world.
CBS has followed the journey of Chris Rosati, a man who lives with ALS. Some time ago he saw two girls at the table next to his at a diner in Durham, NC. He gave them each $50 and told them to do something kind in return.
Rosati left the diner and forgot all about it, until he opened an email that included photos from a remote village in Sierra Leone, West Africa, with people holding signs that read: “Thanks a lot for spreading kindness — Chris Rosati.”
The girls’ father had worked in the Peace Corps and knew about this village in Sierra Leone that had been fighting hard against Ebola, so the girls helped pay for a feast to celebrate being Ebola-free.
The butterfly effect might be a physics concept, but it applies to more than just physics.
Every little change in the ways we communicate, connect, and discover has incredible effects for anything where people are involved, including businesses. The next step is to predict these changes.
Capgemini, a research consulting agency, published a report on businesses facing this digital change called “The Digital Advantage: How Digital Leaders Outperform Their Peers in Every Industry.” In it, Capgemini found that those companies that are highly vested in digital integration and management have increased profits, and have higher market valuations than those who don’t.
Got some marketing and advertising predictions of your own? Let us know in the comments, and don’t forget to share this with someone who could use a little marketing insight.
Images courtesy of: Rhett Maxwell, L2inc.com and CBS.
