Social Media Marketing Trends For 2025: What You Need to Know

Different platforms suit different brands and applications. However, in the competitive digital landscape, there is one platform that consistently delivers results irrespective of the industry and target audience. To stay ahead, this platform is essential regardless of your marketing budget. Yes, we are talking about social media. And today we’re discussing social media trends for 2025. 

So, what’s on the horizon? Are there new social media platforms you need to get ready for? What are the content formats that you should be focusing on? What are the innovative strategies you need to adopt to stay ahead in a competitive space? 

We can’t wait to explore the answers to these questions. So, without further ado, let’s go! 

8 of the Most Anticipated Social Media Marketing Trends for 2025

1. You’ll see more of AI 

One of the biggest social media trends of 2025, one that you probably know is the dominance of AI. 

Social media platforms now have integrated AI tools for creators and brands to use to ideate, create content, or even run ads effortlessly. In fact, according to Statista, about 42% of marketers use AI to generate social media copy. So, this trend will definitely continue in 2025 with more and more marketers integrating AI tools into their social media marketing workflows. 

To start with, explore the inbuilt AI tools on the social media platform of your choice. 

• TikTok has Symphony – their creative AI suite for advertisers. 
• YouTube has an extensive set of AI tools for advertisers to edit their videos, find inspiration, and even streamline advertising on the platform. 
• Meta’s AI tools allow you to generate images and videos in seconds. With some creative tweaks, these are wonderful assets for brands on social media to engage their followers to enhance their promotions. 

In addition to this, you can use AI in social media marketing for:

• Content brainstorming when creating your social media content calendar. 
• Generating copy and captions. 
• Editing videos. 
• Monitoring your social media page performance.
• Keeping an eye on trends. 

And there are so many other ways in which you can start using AI in social media marketing. 

For a more comprehensive view, check out our blog on leveraging AI for social media marketing. 

2. Mindful adoption of trends 

Gone are the days when brands took on every social media challenge and embraced every social media trend. As social media analysis and social listening are becoming more and more efficient brands are now moving toward strategic focus. 

Accordingly, we believe that in 2025, brands will be more cautious when it comes to trendjacking. Instead of jumping on every trend that emerges, brands will prioritize ones that resonate with their core values and connect with their audience. 

According to Hootsuite, nearly 31% of marketers who use social listening tools rely on them to analyze and understand trends. Hence one of the likely social media marketing trends of 2025 is the shift toward a mindful adoption of social media trends in place of trying to go viral with every fad that briefly pops up. 

3. Social commerce will be the future of shopping 

Social commerce is not a new concept. Remember the time when platforms like Instagram and Twitter (now X) allowed users to create shops within their social media pages? But some of these features have changed and the popularity of social commerce has been fluctuating. 

However, we think that the rise of social commerce will be one of the biggest social media marketing trends of 2025.

In general, social commerce is about simplifying the shopping experience for consumers by allowing them to discover products and place their orders on the same platform. Consumers rely heavily on social media to discover products and brands. In fact, among Gen Z consumers nearly 60% have discovered brands and products through social media. Therefore, shopping via social media seems like a convenient move. 

Here’s a quick stat to prove this. TikTok Shop has reportedly been seeing a 165% increase in holiday shoppers year-over-year. Other platforms have also seen a significant increase in the number of social buyers and hence this is one of the social media marketing trends of 2025 that’s totally worth investing in. 

So, how do you adopt this trend and strategize for social commerce? 

• Use Product Tags and other features on Instagram to allow users to shop for your products through your posts and ads. 
• Use Commerce Manager to set up shop, create collections, and enhance shopping via Meta apps. 
• For focusing on young audiences, and niche communities use the Snapchat Store feature. 
• Make the most of Shoppable videos on YouTube. The platform now lets you tag products recommended in the video or even clickable product stickers. 

4. Brands will take page verifications more seriously 

The popular social media platforms are all free. Hence even small businesses with tight marketing budgets find it easy to increase awareness and reach through socials. 

However, social media platforms now seem to be pushing paid subscriptions and verifications. Firstly, verifications are a way for brands to gain access to more features in addition to those available for free accounts. In fact, most social media platforms allow extensive analytics along with better-optimized reporting features for verified accounts. 

Secondly, verified accounts also help boost credibility on social media. Most social media platforms visibly display verification badges on the profile page: 

• A gold tick on X 
• Blue tick on Instagram/Facebook 
• Grey checkmark on YouTube
• Blue checkmark on TikTok 
• The verified badge on LinkedIn 
• The yellow star on Snapchat 

All these physical indicators allow brands to establish their credibility and they help consumers distinguish genuine brand accounts from fakes. Remember the time when a fake Elon Musk profile led to a £400,000 scam on X? 

Similarly, consumers who lose money or face a bad experience through fake brand accounts often do not return to the brand or might altogether turn skeptical.

Taking all these into account, the increase in popularity of paid subscriptions is one of the anticipated social media trends of 2025. 

For instance, the yellow star badge in the below image helps you confirm that this is indeed the official Snapchat page of Taco Bell and not an imposter. 

In addition to the boosted trust, platforms also offer verified brand pages exclusive access to useful features for advertising and engagement. For example, verified organizations on X have access to the Hiring option and Affiliations. 

5. Focus on long-form videos for better engagement 

Short-form videos are still the undefeated champions when it comes to social media. However, the social media trends of 2025 indicate that long videos might gain popularity as well. 

For instance, TikTok recently took a long-form leap. Yes, the platform that popularized the short bite-sized video format now allows users to record videos of up to 10 minutes long and upload videos of up to 60 minutes long.

Secondly, Shorts on YouTube are now longer with the support for videos up to 3 minutes long. 

Similarly, Instagram has been expanding the total length of videos that can be recorded directly via the platform. And now you can upload or record multiple clips adding up to 3 minutes for Instagram Reels. 

This is what we are talking about. Not an hour-long video but videos that are about a few minutes long. No doubt, you still need quick and easy short videos to boost your brand’s reach but then when it comes to engagement, when it comes to driving action like shopping through your Reels and Shorts videos that are slightly longer might be your best bet. 

X which was late to join the video game now has a strong focus on video content with a dedicated TV app for videos and the support for videos up to 4 hours long for Premium subscribers. 

But one thing is for sure – videos will be indispensable assets for rising above competition in 2025. 

Need help with editing your videos to optimize them for various social media platforms? Get a KIMP Video subscription. 

6. Brands will focus on building connections and communities 

As users increasingly value authentic brand connections and meaningful interactions, brands will start focusing more on community building through social media. 

This trend reflects the evolving expectations of audiences who want to feel part of something larger and have their voices heard. 

For instance, the broadcast channel feature on Instagram and WhatsApp have gained a lot of traction this past year and we are seeing more and more brands tapping into this feature to nurture their community. 

Here is a snapshot of the broadcast channel of Creators on Instagram. This is where Meta shares quick updates with creators who are looking to make the most of the platform. 

So, one of the anticipated social media marketing trends of 2025 is the widespread adoption of community-building features like Meta’s Channels. 

To build on these features and strengthen the authenticity of your brand on social media, it is also important to prioritize two-way communication. Instead of posting and ghosting, start responding to user comments. Use personalized responses for a better impact. 

For example, the post here from Semrush prioritizes engagement rather than promotion. It delivers content relatable to the brand’s target audience, marketers. Therefore the engagement on the post is good and Semrush’s replies to the user comments enhance the impact of the post. 

7. Fandom will be a key focus 

As social media trends in 2025 continue to evolve, brands will find that aligning their content with fandom can significantly boost engagement and reach. Finally, this can also be a great way to nurture brand loyalty. 

Brands tapping into cultural moments, taking pop-culture references, and collaborating with celebrities are all concepts we already know. However there has been an increase in the trend of brands leveraging fandom. 

According to YouTube, nearly 93% of Gen Z fans have chosen YouTube to consume content about people or things they are fans of. 

Hence, now is a good time to understand your target audience’s likes and dislikes. Know what they are fans of – games, movies, characters, TV shows – it could be anything that gets them excited. These are the places where you will find inspiration for your social media content in the coming years. 

McDonald’s WcDonald’s campaign that resonates with anime fans is a good example. 

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by McDonald’s (@mcdonalds)

So, how can you tap into this trend? Develop campaigns that celebrate and empower fan communities on social media. For example, host online challenges/contests for fans, leverage interactive storytelling or host virtual fan-focused events. 

8. Social media as a search engine 

The evolution of social media as a search engine will be one of the major social media marketing trends of 2025. This is again in line with the fact that people are relying on social media to discover new brands or even research brands they are a little familiar with. 

From product recommendations to unboxing videos and reviews, consumers are consuming diverse kinds of content to enhance their purchase process. 

Just about a year ago, TikTok added a Search Ads toggle to help advertisers place ads in Search within the platform. Similarly, platforms like Instagram are refining the ads displayed on the search results page. These are all measures to allow consumers to directly find brands, products, and brand pages when using the search feature within that platform. 

Taking this trend into account:

• Tap into the personalized search capabilities on social media platforms. 
• Use social media SEO to create posts that make use of the most relevant keywords. 
• Create social media content that educates users and answers their queries. 
• Design visuals that are informative and relevant.
• Use social listening tools to identify the most common questions your consumers have and design content relevant to these. 

From hashtags to categories and topics, use relevant tags on different platforms to categorize your post and ensure that it is displayed for the right search terms. 

Choose KIMP & Design Social Media Posts That Align With the Trends 

Want to explore these social media marketing trends of 2025? Then you need a strong plan for visual content. That’s where an unlimited design service like KIMP comes in. With a dedicated design team working on your brand’s visuals, designing for social media is no longer a tough job. On-brand consistent visuals for your social media pages, image and carousel ads for social media, thumbnails for your YouTube videos, and branding elements like profile pictures and cover images – all your social media designs in one place! 

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