2011 is gone, and 2012 has rolled in without missing a beat. The social media marketing industry is growing in leaps and bounds. I often hear business people say social networking is like the Wild Wild West! So answer this question for me personally. Would it be valuable if you knew the future social media marketing trends for 2012? How wonderful would it not be to learn what trends come in store for the year ahead? Could you adequately prepare for this rapidly changing industry? In the following paragraphs, I provide my 2012 predictions for the evolving trends in the social-networking industry. It certainly is gratifying when my predictions come true. My predictions are not predicated on any sort of special powers. They are based on my industry research, what I read and what I see happening each day in my own work. My accuracy rate in the social media industry has been about 97 percent. However, even though I’m wrong it’s only because my timeline finished up being longer than I thought it was going to be. I have a knack for spotting social media marketing trends. And this article lists four powerful trends unfolding right now. You can benefit from what I say or ignore me, the decision is yours. Either way these trends will unfold as the year progresses. So read on and heed my advice. Prepare your social media marketing campaigns to take advantage these trends for 2012 and beyond.

Prediction #1) Social Media Networks and Marketing will continue to grow at an alarming rate.

Last year Facebook grew from around 600 million to 800 million users depending on whose numbers you think. Twitter and LinkedIn also both showed growth and added many new features, (not to mention that they both acquired several new partners and internet assets). Increase this, Google started Google+, and Microsoft is reported to be in the works of creating their own social network. The adoption rate of small business will lead the way, but expenditures by large corporations will exceed that of both small and medium-size businesses. My first advice for you is; create and implement “an employee social media use policy” to control business hour usage. Second, create a social media marketing intend to reach and engage this enormous market. Combining both engagement and pay per click campaigns work best.

Prediction #2) One of the largest players in the social media marketing arena will make a “miss step” in 2012.

I believe that one of the top four Social Media Network companies will make an expensive mistake causing them to lose significant market share. At Luxury Travel Tip of the larger social media giants like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn all share one crucial flaw. They make an effort to make it extremely difficult to talk to them. Take Facebook, for example. They do not list any contact information apart from a Facebook page. Sure they will have lots of help pages. Yes, Facebook has a blog, lots of YouTube videos, but provides no contact number where you can call and talk to a human being? They do have a Facebook page it is possible to enter suggestions about, but that’s it. What goes on when you get a strange message from Facebook, or you’re having difficulty together with your account? You post a note and never get yourself a reply! Twitter and LinkedIn are not much better. They don’t list a contact phone number or address either. However, I have found that they do reply to your email and posted messages, though it sometimes takes provided that seven days to get a reply.

In my opinion, of the very best three social media companies, LinkedIn provides the best service. Google is new in this game. It’s not as an easy task to lump them in with all of those other social media marketing giants yet. However, I could tell you that Google includes a notoriously poor customer support reputation. It has been my experience with Google that the grade of service you receive depends on the person you obtain on the phone. The good news is that you may get someone on the telephone! Google does list contact numbers. My advice to any business is easy, be ready to create changes to your social media marketing campaign if you need to. Furthermore, if you’re using the top four social media marketing services, make a backup of your data. This is just in case you opt to make “the switch” and ditch one of these players.

Prediction #3) Google+ will become among the top 3, in the social network arena by the finish of 2012.

I know I’m going out on a limb here, but I really believe this is inevitable. Google’s share size and current customer base allows Google+ to cultivate at a much faster pace than other social media marketing sites. The exact number of Gmail users is not public, but we do know that it is huge! I have read estimates ranging from about 190 million to 250 million accounts. Furthermore, Google owns so many internet properties, that they can easily integrate the utilization of these properties into their social networking. This adds value with their social network. Increase this, the point that Google owns Google Search, Google AdWords, YouTube, Blogger and Picasa. Are you starting to obtain the picture? Google is gigantic. Google controls the lion’s share of internet traffic and advertising dollars.

Google has also been able to make a social-networking product that is simple to use, internet search engine friendly and innovative. These qualities’ have made them the internet leader they are today. I am not sure they can keep this frantic pace forever, but for 2012, it’s a done deal. My advice to you is to review what your location is spending your advertising money and see if it makes sense using the Google properties. If you’re a person, and also have been waiting on the sideline with Google+, stop what you’re doing and take the 10 minutes to create a Gmail and Google+ account. In the event that you already have a Gmail account, this will only take you about 5 minutes. The bonus here is you may also setup a Google+ Brand page with out a lot of fuss.