10 Overdone Social Media Tactics Of 2014 That Need To Die

With the year 2014 coming to an end, the social space witnessed a bunch of brands doing and re-doing contests and age old tactics, to an extent that the idea became absolutely obsolete. What you'll see in the next 5 minutes while reading this article is something that every brand should avoid doing in 2015, in order to stand out. The phenomenon called the bandwagon effect holds true to this case. After a brand has witnessed a mediocre rate of success or has seen engagement levels shooting up higher than normal, other brands rush in to do it too.

Here’s a list of the top 10 picks -

#1 The Selfie Craze -

Now who can forget this? The incessant need to pull that phone out before you step out of the house, after you step put, before eating, after eating, while driving (Wait, what?), while on the verge of sleeping, on waking up, when at work, when not at work, when in a meeting, one in traffic, the other on empty roads.. The list never ends!
Here’s how it sort of started:

If only Bradley's arm was longer. Best photo ever. #oscars pic.twitter.com/C9U5NOtGap

— Ellen DeGeneres (@TheEllenShow) March 3, 2014

And then a barrage of brands took over the selfie mania. And fans didn’t wait a second to start participating! Marketing: 1 Rest of the World: 0!      

#2 ThatMomentWhen –

That moment when too was all over the place this year. With multiple variations to it that including Our reaction when That feeling when, That awkward moment when etc.    

#3 Replace movie names with - 

The hashtag caught on real quick. Eventually everything under the sun was being replaced with #MovieNames!      

Love Sex Aur Dhokla. #ReplaceMovieNamesWithFood. — Vaibhav Shah (@Aviation_Freak) May 12, 2014

Paav Ke liye bhookha kucch bhi krega #ReplaceMovieNamesWithFood

— syd (@PunKhaa) July 11, 2014

Coffee khushi, Coffee Gham Whats your #ReplaceMovieNameswithCoffee Movie? #SitDownQuestion — Cafe Coffee Day (@CafeCoffeeDay) January 23, 2013

 

#4 Facts quotes and did you know's: - 

How could you not know that beer dates back to the early Neolithic or 9500 BC, when cereal was first farmed OR that cheese originates from before history itself was recorded. No problem. Brands today are ensuring you know your “did you knows” right!

#5 Meal postings -

Though these were popular even last year, this year every second picture seems to be food and every 3^rd selfie seems to have an element of consumables in it.

#6 Real time posting - 

Since social media is about to take a massive 30 degree turn this year with a curb even on promotional content, value driven content will be at the forefront. In fact it already started and these pages below were at the helm of it.

The Suarez Bite-a-thon

The iPhone Bendgate

#7 Enticing discounts on app downloads - 

A simple marketing strategy gone extensively common, the app store saw a large quantum of apps bolstered by heavy funding. In order to garner downloads there had to be a way around in doing this. Here’s one such overdone way.

#8 Customised Dictionary - 

Who doesn’t want to create an Oxford of their own, branding it with their product offering and packaging words to fit what they serve.

#9 Memes and using them to communicate - 

A practice Amul has been following for years and a practice finally brands have gotten onto. And how!

- Volkswagon and what they should have done.

- Coca-Cola and what they already did with memes

#10 Targeting other brands

Mudslinging lost its ‘condescending’ tag when brands openly took to each other in leaving no stone unturned. Kind of like a mark of respect to some extent.

So here was an overview of the 10 overdone tactics, that made an attempt to go viral in the year 2014!

Anything missed or something you would like to add? Feel free to chip in!