Social media is all about trends. People love them. People like talking about what’s new, what’s cool, what’s boring and what’s sad. It’s all about what people think of diverse topics. The interesting thing is that companies can use this fact to their advantage. Companies can start a trend, and see the buzz build up. This is probably one of the best ways to prove the power of social media. You do something awesome, and let it trend. Here are some reasons why aiming for “Trends” as a strategy is a good decision:

Trends Can Be Customizable

An important aspect to know about trends is that the more people can customize it, the more powerful they will be. For example, Twitter trends like #FollowFriday work so well because they are “owned” by each person, everyone uses it as they see fit. Every time someone tweets with that trend, they are deciding on the content while still being part of the movement. The reason why this customization shouldn’t be discouraging (on the contrary) is that even though people get to be the leading actors, everyone knows who’s responsible for it (when done well!). See @micah for example, responsible for #FollowFriday.

Trends Are Sticky

The reason some campaigns or ideas trend is because they stick to people. It becomes fun to share, to investigate and to go back to it constantly. If your company can provide stickiness with their ideas, they are securing some good word of mouth for their brand. Stickiness means consistency, it creates constant presence on your customers’ minds. The visibility of your product increases the more and longer people share your idea. In other words, the success of a trend is proportioned to how sticky it is.

Trends Can Be Explosive

When done right, an interesting idea can explode and take over the online world. Ok, maybe I’m exaggerating, but it can definitely be a huge success overnight. Trends are very much like news. If they are important, relevant, exciting or interesting, everyone will talk about them! Sometimes going for explosion instead of stickiness is a great move, since you gain a lot of time and can have a lot of exposure fairly quickly.

Trends Are Fun

Maybe the most important aspect of a trend in social media is the fun aspect. This is ultimately the main reason people take part of them. Because, really, what’s better for individuals in social media than to have fun? And what’s better for your brand than to be the responsible for that fun? Games and fun is what’s coming, this is what’s going to trend in the future. Don’t believe me? Check out Facebook and see for yourself how much time people spend playing there, or look at David Armano’s third prediction for social media in 2010.

Your customers want to have a good time. Maybe in an explosive way, maybe by customizing. You need to give them that. Let them trend!

Carlos Miceli. Argentinian. Questioner of things. OwlSparks’ blogger. Freelance writer. Entrepreneur. Every day philosopher. Skill learner.

Tags: community, Marketing, Social Media, Technology, the right way