To ride the wave of the next big thing in social media, it often takes a lot of trial-and-error, a good deal of trendspotting, and some courage to try new things. I’ve spent some time reading up on what’s to come for social media and I’d love to get your thoughts on three new trends that might be monumental.

Source: 3 Soon-To-Be Social Media Trends You Can Profit On | The Next Web

Disruption and innovation are the mantras of the day. This is not just a management fad. These have become cornerstones of competitiveness. Technology—in particular the digitization of the enterprise—is having a profound impact on today’s businesses. It is accelerating market shifts, enabling the creation of new business models.

Source: Managing for Disruption: Lessons in Building Brand Clarity | Branding Magazine

Are you ready? Chatbots are being embraced at an unprecedented rate because they are easy to build, scalable — since they can be powered across a range of platforms — and are both useful and promotional, said Christian Brucculeri, CEO and director at Snaps. The future of branded bots, he said, will be brands “owning” areas and “offering smart utilities. “A grocer or a food brand, for instance, could develop a recipe generator bot, so all one has to do is type the name of an ingredient, and get a bunch of recipe recommendations.”

Source: Brands as Chatty Friends: Are Chatbots ‘The Beginning of a New Internet’? | Digiday

Digital disruption can be a frightening game, especially when some of the players are as yet out of view. By subjecting the sources of disruption to systematic analysis solidly based on the fundamentals of supply and demand, executives can better understand the threats they confront in the digital space—and search more proactively for their own opportunities.

Source: The Economic Essentials of Digital Strategy | McKinsey & Company

When you think about the amount of content available to us now, how the number of channels through which we reach it proliferates while the forms of content we use to connect are becoming more diverse… how can marketers know where to aim their fire? Importantly, what to stop doing and where to dial up efforts?

Source: Why Brands Must Focus on Emotional Connection | Digital Pulse