State of Social: We wish you an early Christmas

In a month that started with ‘brat’ being hailed as word of the year by Collins Dictionary

and an election result we'd rather forget… join us in reflecting on a jam-packed month of social media updates.

If we hear one more person in the office asking for Christmas music, we can’t be held responsible for our actions… if you can’t either, escape the madness, grab yourself a coffee, and read on. Tell your boss it’s ‘research’ 😛.

Bluesky enters the chat

You’ve been living under a digital rock if you don't recognise the little blue butterfly that’s been popping up everywhere 🦋. No, not that one, we're talking about Bluesky.

It was full-launched in February 2024, but what you might not know is that it was created back in 2019 by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, whose mission was to create a ‘decentralised version of Twitter that no single person or entity owns.’ However, Dorsey stepped down from the board in May 2024, and deleted his account completely in September. It’s now run and predominantly owned by chief executive Jay Graber as a US public benefit corporation. So why is it all of a sudden gaining traction? And should you be using it?

Twitter has had a very public and very turbulent few years… and most people have turned to Meta’s Threads as a natural replacement for the app. However, as of this month, Bluesky now has over 20m users – gaining a HUGE one million new sign-ups per day in November.

Bluesky in its own words is "social media as it should be", although we can’t lie, it is giving Twitter 2011 (IYKYK). With a sidebar to the left featuring all the familiar search, notifications and app related features you can expect, it’s a hit of nostalgia for millennials, and maybe that’s part of its appeal?

Not only is it visually appealing, it works WITHOUT AN ALGORITHM! Unlike Threads, where Meta’s AI recommended-posts are rammed down are necks with no escape, Bluesky feels exactly that – freeing, empowering, user-centric and fresh!

This has of course led to some marketing bro-off’s from Meta (who have clearly been feeling the heat). They responded to Bluesky’s users announcement with Adam Mosseri sharing that Threads had already surpassed 15 million signups for November alone. We think the surge in Bluesky adoption led to some shiny new Threads updates – including the ability to schedule posts, a significant change to show more posts from people you follow, and even bringing back ✨The Chronological Feed✨ (yes, you can try and fail to pry that emoji from my cold millennial hands)

So, in conclusion – despite it still being small fry compared to Threads and X, Bluesky might not be the answer to our nostalgic Twitter mourning, but its exponential growth shows that it's delivering something the people want, and proving that it’s one to watch. 

RIP to the hashtags we used to know

Social Media Managers (myself included) have been banging on for years about SEO and keywords in captions being better than the humble hashtag, but not ever did we think we’d lose them, forever!

Instagram boss, Adam Mosseri, has announced that from December 13th users will be unable to follow hashtags, and hashtag feeds will cease to exist.

This update shows a REAL shift, in Instagram's historic content discovery approach. In the golden days of #instagood – hashtags were EVERYTHING, a cornerstone of Instagram's engagement strategy. However in recent years, with more of a focus on keywords and SEO within captions, hashtags have gradually diminished in importance, and henceforth ‘had their day’.

The change also comes as a deterrent to spammers, who have long targeted trending hashtags with spam posts and general junk to try and gain reach.

With the entire removal of hashtags rumoured, this hasn’t been confirmed nor denied by Insta-bosses. We predict hashtag pollution will still exist both in searches and Explore feeds, but with this new change, your main feed will be protected.

This change might also bring back the strength of the follow button – as we mentioned in our previous blog here. Meta’s AI-recommended and curated feed is STRONG, we rarely see what our friends post anymore. Could this be a push into encouraging people to actually follow their favourite creators, friends, family members and co-workers? Are they finally listening to their audience’s wants and needs? Instagram needs to work harder than ever to keep creators creating, to maintain interest and activity on the platform – especially with all these new rival platforms popping up.

As a millennial, I can’t help but feel a slight sense of panic, as once upon a time hashtags served the primary tool for generating engagement, expanding reach, and tapping into trends, topics and the chance to be discovered – all through strategic hashtag use.

Our advice to you? Use them while you can, because why not. But follow these simple steps to ensure you’re getting it right for your account/s:

• Use 2-5 hashtags max – any more and your post may be labelled as spam by the Instagram overlords.
• Make sure hashtags are relevant to what you’re posting – do they make sense? Do they relate to the post?  
• Think audience firstT – do they make sense to the people you’re trying to reach with the post? If not, scrap them, as it will only be a turn-off for your viewer.
• Concentrate on keywords – in your captions, on your visual elements, ad through your actual content. Think SEO like you’ve never thought about it before to ensure your posts get seen by the audience you want to reach.

Virtual Avatars?

Yes, this is real…

Could this really be the future of social media platforms? Virtual avatars could be the future of digital interaction, with platforms moving further and further away from traditional social elements. Well our mate Mark seems to think so…

Mark Zuckerberg, has recently openly talked about AI-generated content becoming a bigger part of the social media experience. Which happens to have gone hand in hand with their current push to introduce more generative AI elements into their platforms.

And it’s not just Meta that are at it, TikTok could be following hot on their heels according to the latest update for Chinese version of the platform – ‘Douyin’. This project is mysteriously named 'Project V' – which although still in development, aims to “expand the boundaries of live streaming and interaction.”

AIbase describe the project as;

The core highlight of the "V Project" is the AI Avatar feature. This feature allows creators to generate a virtual avatar that resembles their personality and thinking, enabling continuous interaction with users 24/7. Users can engage in conversations with this avatar to gain insights and suggestions from the creator, ensuring real-time interaction whether the creator is online or not.

This takes our recent favourite phrase ‘chronically online’ to a whole new level!

The avatar tool will enable creators to build video versions of themselves, using previous interactions, historic posts, and other information about the user to create a lifelike iteration of the user.

Can we see this taking off here? We’re not so sure…

A bot will forever be just that, an AI bot. No matter how lifelike they appear, can they really take the place of genuine, human connection? The very golden thread that runs through the heart and point of social media? Does it have a place outside of initial novelty value?

We’d love to hear your thoughts.

Got something to say?

We love to chat social stuff, so ping us an email or reach us over on Instagram, or LinkedIn.

Bye for now!