• by Jeff Urban , Columnist, January 20, 2017

As 2017 brings a new calendar year and a whole host of resolutions for many, the industry is looking for predictions and trends to sink its teeth into. With many different formats, what should we expect from content consumption in 2017? 

1. Social influencers will continue to diversify, specialize and captivate audiences. 

For the last few years, with the rise of social influencers such as Dude Perfect, Anna Akana, DJ Khaled and so many more, in many different fields, we have seen social media influencers rise to celebrity status. Thanks to research from Twitter, they found that 49% of consumers seek purchase guidance from social media influencers, and 20% said that a Tweet from an influencer inspired them to share their own product recommendation. That remains true in 2017. As these influencers continue to dominate social media platforms, audiences will continue to consume their content.

2. As social influencers remain important, so will influencer marketing.

Influencer marketing has been in the industry’s bag of tricks for a few years now. But with 2017, we suspect that more brands and companies will work on leveraging social influencers to create meaningful conversations with their target consumer. We also suspect that a better measurement system will emerge as the industry standard for looking at analytics across the board.

3. Mobile devices are going to continue to rise in terms of content consumption. 

According to Nielsen, over 85% of Generation Y owns a smartphone. With such a large portion of the population consuming content from the palm of their hands, 2017 will continue to be dominated by multiple, smaller screens. Although the death of TV might have been prematurely reported, what we do know is that content consumption is no longer a singular place experience. If you’re watching TV, you’re also checking Instagram. If you’re watching a Facebook Live stream, you are also texting your friends about it. The solo watching experience is extinct.

4. Formats such as live video, virtual reality, augmented reality and more will continue to peak interest.

In 2016, the industry saw the rise of technology that made sharing content in real-time possible from almost each and every social platform. With the emergence, and widespread adoption, of these platforms, audiences are calling for more. With live streaming, comes authenticity and we know that audiences, especially millennial ones, hold that to be one of the most important tenants to keep consuming content.

In addition to the live streaming game, we also saw other types of content creation take off as well in 2016. If we learned anything from the rise of Pokémon Go, it’s that there is obviously an audience for augmented reality in some form. We also saw virtual reality really hit its stride with activations such as when the NBA Digital and NextVR partnered to provide fans with an exciting digital experience through once a week virtual reality games.