Social Media Marketing in 2025: Key Trends for SMBs
Social media marketing in 2025 is changing. New tools, features, and customer expectations are reshaping the way we market at SMBs.
Understanding these changes is a must for brands in diverse regions, like Germany, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. Therefore, here are the top trends you need to know:
AI Content & Personalisation
Whether you like it or not, AI is changing digital marketing, and social media is no exception.
Nowadays, marketers aren’t using AI to just ‘reply’ to emails. They’re using it to create social content in all formats: text, image, and video. We’ve even seen AI influencers with over 2.4 million followers.
Even better, creating this AI-powered content is inexpensive. AI content creation tools like ChatGPT, Jasper, and Midjourney are relatively cheap and available to SMBs.
This opens doors to endless opportunity. Personalised content production is one of them.
Back in the day, if a small marketing team wanted to go international or break into a new market, they’d need to hire a bunch of locals. Locals for research, locals for content, locals for cultural guidance, etc.
However, now, this isn’t necessary. By using AI in social media, Someone in-house, even if they’re not a native, can do all of these jobs. A single native might be required to verify the content, but they don’t need to be a full-time employee.
For SMBs, globalisation isn’t just something to dream about. It’s now a real consideration. And in a world that’s getting more and more connected to one another, this presents a wonderful opportunity to grow.
Short-Form Video and Social Commerce
Nowadays, you can’t escape short-form video. It’s everywhere and it’s working REALLY well.
TikTok was the first to really push short-form, and it’s still one of the best platforms out there. On average, each piece of content on this platform gets 18,173 views.
You have others as well. Instagram Reels, Facebook Reels, YouTube Shorts, and more. Instagram Reels for business is great. They’re the second-best platform, generating 16,151 average views per video. It’s even now possible to preview short-form videos on Google.
If brands aren’t pushing short-form video, they need to. It can also be replicated on multiple platforms, increasing brand exposure and viewership massively.
Now, however, there’s been a slight upgrade to short-form video, something in which brands are taking advantage of. This is social commerce, like TikTok Shop
TikTok Shop (and the same with the alternatives) allow users to purchase products directly on the app without them having to leave. It blends into the social content and makes the process from content to purchase seamless.
There are countless success stories from TikTok Shop as well. Enchanted Scrunch, for example, says 90% of her sales come from TikTok Shop. LaLa Hijabs, another SMEs, says 60% of their sales come from this channel.
SMEs, if they aren’t already, need to pay attention to this. It’s still fresh and worth considering, especially if your products are video-worthy and you don’t have the budget for TikTok advertising.
Micro Community Building
76% of internet users are part of a community, and 8 in 10 of them say being part of a community makes them more likely to purchase from a brand.
These are some of the very reasons SMEs should focus on micro community building. But why not community building?
Community building is excellent and a good practice. However, micro community building develops much stronger relationships, making every member feel heard, valued, and part of something.
And, with the rise of AI-powered content creation (as mentioned above), executing micro community campaigns has become more seamless.
It’s even possible to develop multiple micro communities at once, even with a small marketing team, maybe even a one-person army.
Those who focus on this will reap the benefits. In a time where 98% of people in online groups say they feel a sense of belonging, this is more important than ever.
Conclusion
The three main trends in social media marketing in 2025 are the use of AI content creation for personalisation, short-form video and social commerce, and micro community building.
Each of them complements the other as well. Therefore, SMEs should focus on all three, as it’ll help increase scalability, user engagement, and conversions.
