2022 social media trends: Twitter and LinkedIn marketing strategy

A lot has changed in the digital landscape over the last year. What hasn’t? The importance of social media. Brands today are built on social. So, it’s due strategy and resources that match the level of importance consumers pay it.

All posts across every channel need amazing creative—vibrant art (a video, GIF, or at least an image), excellent copy and to point to high-quality content. They also need amplification. The days of social posts without paid support are over.

Then there are the tactics that are unique to each network. In our new blog series, our social specialists analyzed what’s working (and not) on the primary social networks. They started with Facebook and Instagram. Here, we review Twitter and LinkedIn marketing strategy.

LinkedIn Marketing Strategy

LinkedIn is the most trusted social network and has a few advantages over platform peers. The types of data it collects on users—like job title, company and job function—make it extremely appealing to B2B companies.

• In case you missed it: LinkedIn enhanced its LinkedIn Event/Live experience with event ads and rolled out Business Manager. This made data sharing among Ad Accounts easier. Still, Microsoft needs to do more to make LinkedIn the powerhouse it hopes it to be. Its analytics need a facelift and the fact that one campaign cannot promote both images and video ads is elementary.

• What’s working—ABM: Campaign Manager provides an array of targeting options, integrations and reporting. These capabilities make it the clear choice for Account-Based Marketing (ABM). Using prospect lists and integrations into a company’s CRM and other platforms like ABM ad platform Madison Logic, advertisers can reach the right accounts and analyze which are generating leads/engaging with content. It’s a specialist’s dream.

• What’s working—distinct thought leadership branding: Thought leadership from the brand and its executives should be cornerstone content on LinkedIn. But since everyone is doing it or trying to, its content and creative need to be distinct. Also, don’t sleep on LinkedIn Articles. They may not have the viewership of Medium or reach of a LinkedIn post but provide an opportunity to amass followers and rank on Google search results.

• What’s working—employee and customer advocacy: Provide employees with links and copy to share on social media. And definitely re-share employee, customer, or advocate posts, as LinkedIn’s algorithm heavily favours individual posts.

• What to try—B2C marketing: With a generally high-earning user base, there are clear advantages to B2C brands using the targeted demographics to capture applicable “professionals” through organic and sponsored posts and ads. After all, consumers are professionals too and this platform is less saturated with consumer marketing.

• TL; DR: LinkedIn marketing should unequivocally be a part of your social strategy, B2B or B2C. Use all its features to the fullest ability. So many (like Product Pages, Life and LinkedIn Live) are underutilized.

Twitter Trends & Changes

Then-CEO Jack Dorsey resigned in November 2021, making waves about the future of the platform. Parag Agrawal, former CTO, stepped in. If the last few months have been any sign, he’s looking to break the mold and solve gaps in Twitter’s offering.

• What’s working—trend jacking: Twitter is the news cycle platform and creator of the hashtag. As such, we see users tuning into and sharing breaking news, joining for televised events and taking part in like-minded communities. Using the news cycle and trending topics to your advantage (trend jacking) is the name of the game. Content should focus on timely, relevant, hashtag-centric themes such as holidays. Sharing user-generated content is also essential to cultivating a community. Leverage traditional tactics like hosting #QandAs and Twitter Chats. And try new additions to the platform like Twitter Spaces and Twitter Live to help drive community engagement.

• What’s working—hypertargeting: Twitter’s targeting options reflect its users’ objectives. So, targeting conferences, hashtags, conversations, or follower-look-a-likes for other handles all work incredibly well. Think: Using relevant events to drive awareness around a booth presence or speaking engagement at a conference, drive webinar registrations or bring brand/product awareness to a new audience. Leveraging ads to expand brand reach will continue to be essential in 2022, especially through unique offerings like Promoted Trend Spotlights.

• Keep an eye on—ABM: ABM has been a clear gap for B2B marketers. It’s been difficult at best, non-existent at worst. While the CPC is much more appealing than LinkedIn, the latter has way more functionality. In 2022, Twitter will use third-party platform SocialDatabase to enable real ABM campaigns, using “Super Audiences” built out by personas to get in front of the right people.

• Keep an eye on—crypto and NFTs: This is a big focus for Twitter this year, with Twitter Blue Labs in the early stages of testing NFT profile pictures. Brands embracing crypto and enabling users to trade or accept crypto should be active on the platform.

• Anecdotally: While Twitter is still a buzzing platform, it doesn’t quite have the shine factor it once did nor the targeting capabilities of LinkedIn. But it should still have a place in the social media marketing mix for brands with a relevant and active audience on the platform. Use it to take part in discussions around trending events, posts, or topics.

Apply these insights to your Twitter and LinkedIn marketing strategy now. It’s only a matter of time before new trends arise.

This article was initially published by our sister company SHIFT Communications on SHIFT Insights