Thursday, April 7, 2016

How to Keep Up with the Trends on Social Media

Modern journalists always have an eye on social media to see which stories are trending and why. Do you want to track social media trends like the professionals do?
Tracking trending topics on social media is beneficial for news-gathering, and can really help you learn more about topics you’re interested in.
For example, journalists have taken to social media to better reach their audiences and to keep up with trends, which can be vital for their careers. For a journalist, following a trending topic can help them break the next big story or provide them with more information about a current story. The use of social media by journalists has revolutionized the way the news is told.

Why Everyone Should Track Trending Topics on Social Media

As explained above, journalists use social media to learn more about an event unfolding. They find what’s posted online to better investigate and reach out to those involved in a story, which can sometimes be a major international event.
Trending topics on social media are also tracked by marketers and business professionals, who use social tools to better reach their targeted market, which can bring them a bigger return.
Tracking a trending topic can also be important for everyday situations, as it can help anyone better understand a subject they might be interested in. For example, movie stars may leak information on Twitter, a scientist might explain his latest research on Reddit’s AMA series, or a photographer might share the next big picture on Instagram. Knowing how to track these topics can mean that you’ll never miss out on what you find important.

Easily Follow Trends on Facebook

At one time (and it still may be available to some users) Facebook had an option for people to check out what was trending. The option was presented on the sidebar and showed topics that were picking up steam.

Now, if you want to find what’s trending on Facebook, you have to do some digging.
The best way to keep up on the trends is to follow your favorite brands, news agencies, celebrities, and journalists. They’ve been given access (via Facebook Mentions) to better reach out to their followers through live video streams and other updates, which may or may not be a good thing.

Another way to follow the trends on Facebook is through a tool called Signal, which can be used by journalists (and only journalists) to find and organize content from a variety of topics.
With the right content tracked, journalists can then embed their findings online and integrate them into their broadcasts, which can help bring more information to a story. This revolutionary social media tool can help journalists do what they already do, but do it much better.

Why is this a big deal? When used at its maximum, Signal can help journalists follow more stories and better engage their audiences when an important story is breaking, as soon as it is breaking.
The only catch is that it is only available to a “subset of journalists,” as it was explained to me when I requested access just recently.
For anyone that can’t gain access, you can take advantage of other tools or methods so that you’ll never miss out on what’s important to you.

Easily Know the Trends on Instagram

Instagram is a little better, and has more than a few things to say about tracking topics and identifying trends on its service.
To follow a trend, type the hashtag term you want to identify into the search bar and click on your desired term. You’ll see a list of terms and the number of times that hashtag has been used on Instagram.
And don’t worry if you don’t know what to search, you’ll see other related terms after searching for your original item.
You can also check out top-hashtags.com to find what hashtags are trending the most on Instagram. And just like Facebook, be sure to follow your favorite brands or people.

Track Topics on Twitter

Twitter is one of the most important social tools for tracking trends, as many people around the world (where it’s accessible) take to Twitter to share their experiences online, which can sometimes be very newsworthy.
To get the most from Twitter, it is important to use its advanced search function.
In addition, it’s also a good idea to create lists, which can help you better organize who and what you seeHootsuite and TweetDeck are great tools  for this.
Twitter list screenshot
Trendsmap is also a very cool tool, as it shows you the latest trends from anywhere in the world in real-time. Registering for the site is free, and using the site is easy.

Don’t Forget About Google

Google Trends is also especially important for tracking trending topics, and can be sent right to your email. For journalists, Google News Lab is invaluable and can help journalists discover stories and better broadcast to their audience.
For content creators, Google Correlate can be a life saver. As explained on its site, it’s like Google Trends “but in reverse.” The tool uses what’s trending and then displays other words that can be used in relation to your original term.
For example, searching “travel” will display other terms like “condominium,” which can be used together to attract a wider audience.

Google also identifies trends on YouTube, which can be cool and somewhat useful if you’re curious about what’s popular on the video site.

Be sure to checkout their Dashboard, which contains a trending blog and map. You can search and pinpoint what you think is important to follow.
YouTube trending map

Start Tracking Trends

As said earlier, tracking trending topics can help anyone better understand a subject they might be interested in. It’s an important tool, and can be used by journalists, business professionals, or anyone wanting to discover what’s going on in the world.
What you do with that information is up to you.
Do you find trending topics important? Does it help you discover news and events? How do you track trending topics on social media? Tell us your thoughts in the comments below. Source:www.makeuseof.com

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