In this blog, I outline 10 social media trends you need to know about In 2025, and importantly, what you can do about them now for your brand.
Social media is becoming more important than ever for business owners and marketers. The average person now spends 2 hours 20 minutes on social media each day. This is where your customers are, and you can reach them for free! But the social media landscape continues to evolve at such a rapid pace I know it can feel impossible to keep up. So, I am here to tell you what will be key over the next year and what it means for you. Here are 10 social media trends you need to know about in 2025...
1. Social commerce
Social commerce, which is shopping directly on social media platforms without leaving the apps, and it's rapidly becoming a mainstay for online shoppers.
While this trend has been growing for some time, new features like personalised product recommendations and seamless checkouts have transformed platforms like Instagram, TikTok, and Pinterest into powerful e-commerce hubs.
Experts predict even more growth and innovation in social commerce for 2025. Currently, 44% of Instagram users shop on the platform weekly, a number that continues to rise. TikTok Shop also saw explosive growth in 2024, with 58% of TikTok users now shopping directly through the app:
We'll also see a rise in livestream shopping. Instagram lives and TikTok lives are the new QVC! These work best where they are interactive and encourage people to buy in real-time.
What you can do as a brand:
- Product businesses should ensure they have a product catalogue set up in Meta business suite so they can tag products across Facebook and Instagram.
- Experiment with TikTok shop as some businesses are having massive success with it.
- Try a live stream event to show off your products in real-time and prompt immediate action.
2. Social media as a search engine
Social media is rapidly becoming the young person's Google. We've seen a massive shift in where people look for information online. There is a decline of 25% in using Google for search between Generation Z and Generation X, and a quarter of all people primarily use social media now to search online.
Social platforms have adapted to this, and search is now the main way to navigate the apps and the main factor in discoverability. So, if you want your account or content to be found and served to the right people, it's all about search engine optimisation or SEO.
What you can do as a brand:
- Start to treat social media as a mini search engine and get savvy about SEO for your business.
- Optimise your content and account for relevant keywords, and make captions descriptive and keyword-rich.
- Add captions to talking videos and alt text to static photos.
- Be intentional with hashtags.
3. Entertainment Marketing
Next in our list of social media trends you need to know about in 2025 is 'Entertainment Marketing'. The main reason people use social media now is for entertainment. Video content has changed the game, and attention spans have shortened. If content feels boring, it gets scrolled on past pretty fast.
What we are seeing happening, and what is predicted to be a huge social media trend in 2025 is that brands are responding by prioritising entertainment marketing over directly promoting their product or service.
In Hootsuite's Social Media Trends 2025 Survey, they found that >60% of social content now aims to entertain, educate, or inform without direct promotion for nearly half of businesses. And 80-100% of social content is entertainment-driven for a quarter of organisations.
This is huge. Big and small brands are realising that entertainment-driven content increases engagement, brand visibility on social media, growth and emotional connection.
What can you do as a brand:
- Explore what is entertaining, inspiring or educational for your audience.
- Move towards entertainment marketing for a proportion of your content.
- Have fun and be creative; focus on being seen over selling!
Need help with what this looks like for your business? I call entertainment marketing 'valuable content', and I explain exactly how to implement it for any niche, including both product and service businesses, in detail in The Secrets to Instagram Growth. As well as explain how to use social SEO and much more. Explore here.
4. Growing shift to new real-time platforms
Since the Twitter takeover by Elon Musk and rebrand to X, it has been losing users, and this has accelerated since the US election with Elon's political focus and the algorithms seemingly pushing divisive rhetoric for engagement.
Users are migrating to two places: Threads and Bluesky. Both platforms are very similar to how Twitter used to be in that they are real-time social media apps. Threads is the app launched by Instagram in July 2023 to rival X, and Bluesky is the app Twitter founder Jack Dorsey developed.
Threads users have been steadily climbing; now at an estimated 275 million, Bluesky is still the smallest with 24 million users, but with some big celebrities jumping ship from X, it will be interesting to see how it plays out in 2025.
We can also expect to see even more features added to Threads as they attempt to keep their growth going and look towards monetising the platform, which they've always said they'd do once they reach a billion users.
What can you do as a brand:
- You don't need to use every platform! Work out where your customers are.
- But if you already use Instagram, I'd recommend getting set up on Threads. It's a fun platform that is easy to grow and visible with quick text updates.
5. From fact-checking to user moderation
I have to add this because this is hot news at the time of writing. Meta announced on January 7 2025 that they are ending their third-party fact-checking program and moving to a Community Notes model.
In a move heavily influenced by the US election and Donald Trump's opinions on 'free speech', Mark Zuckerberg announced the change in a video, followed by one from Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri.
We've already seen this change when Elon Musk took over X, where the community notes are written and rated by contributing users of the platform.
They also plan to' allow more free speech' by lifting restrictions on certain topics and allowing more political content.
Importantly, these changes are currently being rolled out in the US across Facebook. Instagram and Threads, and not the UK and EU.
What can you do as a brand:
- Watch how this one plays out. We've seen a surge in people searching for 'how to delete Facebook', but how this affects the number of users and how the platforms are used remains to be seen once these changes have rolled out.
- We'll see much more of Trump's influence on social media over the coming year, so I'll keep you posted.
6. Community over followers
If you follow me on Instagram, you'll have seen me talking about this for a while, but in 2025, social media growth won't just be about follower numbers but forming deeper, meaningful connections. This means having fun on Instagram stories, showing up personally, spending time in DMs, chatting with people, and making the conversation feel two-way.
This desire for deeper connection and more personalised interactions will go one step further in 2025 as private groups and brand communities take centre stage. Think Facebook groups, Instagram broadcast channels and other brand channels like Discord and Slack.
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2025 is all about nurturing your fans and making them feel like VIPs!
What can you do as a brand:
- Spend time nurturing the followers you have! Reply to comments and DMs, and interact with your community.
- Encourage two-way interaction like Q&As and polls so your community feel part of something.
- Have the founder (or you) show up personally. The best communities have a leader.
- Consider a private group for your top fans if this could work for your brand, for example, an Instagram broadcast channel, Facebook group or elsewhere.
7. AI-Assisted Content Creation
Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools have exploded over the last couple of years and are revolutionising how content is created and distributed. These will continue to be a massive and definitely a social media trends you need to know about in 2025, so this is your sign to get on board if you aren't already!
Whilst AI can be hugely helpful, the real value is in the human touch, so think AI-assisted content creation. I'm not talking about getting AI to straight out write everything for you because this won't rank as highly on Google or social media platforms.
So many tools can make your life easier as a brand or business owner. Some popular examples:
- Chat GPT, Jasper or Copy.ai to outline blog posts or for idea generation
- Canva's Magic Design tools to help you repurpose images and graphics
- Grammarly AI for grammar checking, spelling and writing improvement
- Midjourney for quick text-to-image graphics and photos
AI tools also make communicating with customers easier, with AI chatbots and DM automation becoming the standard.
If you're not familiar with DM automation, download my free Getting Started with Manychat guide here.
In addition, in 2025, we will see more AI within the social media platforms themselves as they attempt to remain competitive and be the place to go for AI assistance.
What can you do as a brand:
- Use AI for research, content repurposing, analysis, and automating any tasks that can make your life easier.
- Invest in your AI understanding and capabilities.
- Don't get AI tools to write things without adding a human touch!
8. Authenticity is fundamental
The flipside of the rise of AI-generated social content is that probably the main factor for success now on social media is authenticity.
In 2025, audiences have become bored of perfect brand videos and hyper-curated feeds. What matters above all else is personality, unpolished moments, and genuine, relatable content. Look at what is trending, and often it's the 'low effort' content with heart.
Audiences want content from brands to look and feel human! They want to know that a brand has values and real people behind it. Demonstrating authenticity and genuinely connecting with people should be a priority over and above selling your product or service.
What can you do as a brand:
- Use personal branding and show the human side of your brand. Show up personally and allow people to connect with you or a member of your team.
- Show that behind the scenes. Make videos that give a glimpse into your world and make us feel part of your journey.
- Use storytelling. This is still a major trend on social media. Humans are naturally drawn to stories, so weave this into your content.
- Weave in UGC (user-generated content) from your customers. This social proof demonstrates that real people use your product or service, which builds trust and credibility for your brand and is a great example of 'soft-selling' in 2025.
9. Social media is the new Netflix
With entertainment marketing the new norm, social media is rapidly becoming the new Netflix, and by that I mean the place to go to binge episodic content.
We've all done it: landed on someone's page and gone down a rabbit hole for 20 minutes, right?!
And you've seen brands jump on this with content series where they develop a theme and then keep giving people updates or the next instalment. Marks and Spencer jumped on this last year with a series involving Mark Wright and Spencer Matthews (Marks and Spencer, get it?!). Every instalment was such fun to see pop up!
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And I've been doing it over the last year with my Easy Reel Tutorials, which are up to Episode 22 now!
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The trend towards binge-able and episode-like content will only increase in 2025. So, 2025 is the year to start thinking about your account like a TV show!
What can you do as a brand:
- Have distinctive content pillars or 'buckets'. Giving regular updates on a topic helps viewers know what to expect from you and keeps them watching.
- Use the idea of a series where you have short-form video 'episodes' on a theme.
- Use cliffhangers! Think about how your favourite TV shows tease you with what's to come. You can do this too to excite people about a future product launch, your next post or something you are working on. Leave people wanting more!
10. Short-form video leads the way
And talking about binge-able content, we have to finish our list of social media trends you need to know about in 2025 with the number one way to present content in 2025: short-form video.
TikTok changed the social media landscape, and short-form videos are now everywhere, from Instagram Reels to YouTube Shorts, Facebook Reels, X and even LinkedIn.
Designed to entertain, but also our desire to scroll quickly and fit into people's short attention spans, short-form videos last anything from 5-90 seconds (but often under 30 seconds) and deliver information in an entertaining and digestible format.
Short-form videos typically have a much longer life span than static content and get more engagement and reach, whatever platform you are on. (The exception being Threads, which is very much a non-video platform.)
If you run a small business, brand or work in social media, it's essential you understand how to get the most out of this format this year if you are not all over it already.
What can you do as a brand:
- Start to use short-form video content for at least half of your content, especially on Instagram, Facebook and TikTok. There is still a place for static content, but video content needs to lead the way.
- Use hooks that stop the scroll. The most successful pieces of short-form content grab your attention at the start with the words and whatever else is happening on the screen.
- Keep them snappy with a clear message, and remember to entertain, inspire or educate so you add value and people want to watch. Viewing time is everything.
- Keep an eye on your analytics and build on content that works to keep getting views up and reach the right people.
So, there you have it: 10 social media trends you need to know about in 2025. This year is all about connection, keeping people entertained, authenticity, community and video-first. By leveraging these trends, you can stay visible and relevant and ensure social media is one of the key channels people find and shop from your brand. And, as I always say, start small, experiment, and focus on the strategies that work best for your business.
What trends are you excited by? Come share your thoughts in the comments!
P.S. Want to know more about how to do all of these for your business? My self-paced course The Secrets to Instagram Growth can help you with:
- Understanding what 'valuable content' (or entertainment marketing) looks like for your niche
- How to leverage Instagram SEO to be discoverable on the platform
- How to use Instagram to find your people and build a genuine community of your own
- How to be authentic and show up personally
- How to effectively use short-form video and all the other Instagram features
- ...and much more! Discover The Secrets to Instagram Growth here.
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