There’s gold in them thar hills! Business use social media to promote their products and services, engage with clients and customers, while at the same time increasing visibility.
Users, on the other hand, express themselves on these social sites, from opinions about brands to issues they are experiencing in life. This is not just a goldmine of trends and tendencies, but problems and solutions. Or to put it bluntly, your next great business idea!
Here are four simple techniques you can employ to find your inspiration:
Trending topics
What, you thought this first one would be something else? Trending topics now appear on several sites, including the two big ones — Facebook and Twitter. Think of these as social media chatter and buzz, an interaction of news and events.
These are represented by hashtags to show trends that are happening on a global scale. But here’s the fun part. These can be filtered and drilled down to show specific events in your local area. Pay attention to these and you could land your next big idea.
Trending pages
An extension of trending topics, this is the practice of referencing whole pages for topics. Sites like StumbleUpon and Flipboard have such pages, neatly categorized into topics and industries. Give these pages a look, find out what people are saying, and what the big issues are in your field.
Crowdsourcing
With around 2.7 billion people now having used the Internet, one way or another, crowd is a concept that the medium is well acquainted with. Crowdfunding and crowdsourcing, while relatively new notions, are still a great source for discovering new trends.
Businesses and startups use services like Kickstarter and Indiegogo, and these are wonderful sources to discover new products. Find out which ideas received funding, and what the general public thinks about them, and what they are willing to pay. Even review which ideas failed to pick up. Treasure trove.
Visual bookmarking
Vision without implementation is hallucination. But visual bookmarking sites like Pinterest, and even photography communities like Instagram clear away the mirage and show you what users are interested in, what type of content they are collecting, saving and sharing.
More importantly, they give you an idea of what opinions these users have about things. Social sites like these provide an opportunity to view user feedback, a valuable benefit.
There really is no shortage of ideas and business concepts floating around on social media. This, after all, is a medium where users readily share their thoughts, comment on what others have voiced, and provide opinion both negative and positive.
It might take you a few hour or some weeks, but social sites are a resource not to be missed, when you are researching and trying to create your fantastic product or service.