What Is Social Audio and Will It Be the Next Big Thing in Social Media?

We all know that social media giants - like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok -mainly use visuals and text as a means for users to create and share content.  

It wasn’t until recently, when the social audio app Clubhouse gained traction, that these social media platforms started to consider audio as a primary way for users to connect on social.  

The audio was always thought out to be secondary to visual and served as a complement to visual media. But, now that social audio is becoming a trend, audio is finally getting its moment in the limelight.  

Seeing how social audio has gotten increasingly popular, people are now seeking to have voice-based social experiences with their favorite brands.  

Aside from optimizing your social media content for SEO in Miami, we believe that social audio presents a great opportunity for your business to be more relevant in this digital-first world.  

Once you get a grasp of how social audio works, you can use your voice to develop a deeper connection with your audience, build a community, foster brand loyalty, and reach new audiences you’ve never interacted with before!  

In this article, we are going to discuss everything you need to know about social audio, including how you can incorporate it into your digital marketing strategy and if this trend is here to stay.  

Without further ado, let’s get started!

What Is Social Audio?

Social audio or voice-based social media uses audio as a primary means of communication. By integrating social media into an audio experience, users can connect and share their thoughts with like-minded people from across the globe.  

This means everyone can join live conversation rooms where they can discuss or listen to topics they’re interested in, do voice messaging, run podcasts, and so much more.  

In this age of remote work and social distancing, screen fatigue has become a thing - which is why modern consumers are inclined to this growing trend.  

People are tired of looking at their screens for long periods trying to entertain themselves, keep in touch with family and friends, and stay up-to-date with the latest happenings around the globe. Plus, they don’t have to dress up or look good to converse with anybody.  

Is Social Audio a Fleeting Trend or Is It Here to Stay?

With voice search already on the rise, there’s no doubt that social audio will also be a hit in the near future, especially now that Facebook, Twitter, and other major social media players are bringing the social audio experience to their platforms.  

Social audio provides a hands-free, frictionless experience to users. This pretty much explains why an increasing number of individuals now prefer to listen to podcasts to learn new things and use voice commands or smart speakers to conduct a search online and initiate various tasks.  

Social audio is definitely here to stay, so be sure to include it in your marketing mix.  

Why Businesses Should Include Social Audio in Their Marketing Mix‍

Social audio is a new medium you can use to engage your audience, customers, and fans on an entirely new level.  

With audio technology, your listeners can do so much more than just listen and consume audio content – they can interact with you and other like-minded people on the platform too!

You’ll be able to deepen your connection with your audience and foster more meaningful interactions between your listeners where they feel involved and essential throughout their listening experience.  

This would be an opportune moment to develop your brand, establish thought leadership, build a community, and become more customer-centric.  

How to Incorporate Social Audio into Your Digital Marketing Strategy

Whether you’re a marketer or small business owner, you can use this medium in the following ways:

• Personal Branding: Develop personal branding by creating an audio experience specific to your professional identity. Start by making your voice sound confident and influential!
• Event Sponsorship: Build rapport and tap into new audiences by engaging in audio events instead of webinars. You can also grow your reach by working together with leaders in the space.
• Brand Ambassadorship: Establish thought leadership and promote the personal brand by interacting in rooms, discussing topics, and becoming a representative of the values of your company.  
• Audience Analysis: Get to know your audience more and gather data about relevant brand insights by conducting consumer research on social audio platforms.  
• Sentiment Analysis: Just like social listening, you can use social audio to analyze transcripts of conversation to identify what feelings people have about your products, services, and brand.  

• Conversation Analysis: Find out what the next biggest trend will be by analyzing what people are talking about or what keywords they’re using.  
• Peer-to-peer Support: Build a community around your brand by hosting regular conversations where your customers can help one another in troubleshooting and solving problems, engage in meaningful conversations, and bond with one another through voice. Motivate them to join by giving rewards, points, or public praise.  
• Employee Support: Take your customer service to the next level by hosting conversations where your customers can voice their complaints and concerns, and your customer service employees can respond to their needs right away.  

What You Need to Consider Before Joining Social Audio Platforms

For small businesses with limited resources, it’s hard to juggle various social platforms at once and be equally great at all channels. So, before joining a social audio platform, it’s important to think things through and consider the following marketing challenges for your brand:

• You can’t pre-record your audio sessions. It’s basically like doing a radio show.  
• So far, audio content on social audio platforms is not recorded. Meaning, people can’t archive your sessions or look them up later. Your listeners should be there in that moment to experience your content.  
• There are 36 social audio apps in the market today. How can you decide which platform your target audience is using?

Should Social Audio Be in Your Digital Marketing Strategy?

As your go-to SEO company in Miami, we suggest that you wait for this new medium to fully mature before you decide that it's something you want to invest your time and resources into.  

If you feel like this is the perfect platform for your niche, you can absolutely experiment and see if it works for you. Start by establishing your presence on a social audio platform and engaging in conversations here and there. Test the waters and get a feel of how it is before going all out.  

Whether social audio will be the next big thing or just a fleeting trend, you gotta keep an open mind and be ready when it does blow up.  

At Digital Resource, we can help you create a custom digital marketing plan that includes voice optimization and social audio. Our team of digital marketing experts and SEO specialists will put your business ahead of your competitors.  

Contact us today to start optimizing your business for success!

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