It will be a year of reckoning
Over the last two weeks, I participated in some online panel discussions in which the theme was “Social Media Trends for 2020”.
In these, I put forward a few predictions, but the one that seemed to intrigue my fellow panelists the most was that 2020 will be a year of reality checks and reckoning. It will be a year where many of the buzz-words, catch-phrases and made-up titles, filled mostly with hot air, finally sink.
I decided to throw out a few content litmus tests to gauge the collective consciousness on this and judging by the engagement I stand by this call.
The first was aimed at what I see as a persistent encouragement for everyone to become a thought leader in their industry.
If everyone is leading who is following?
There’s a natural logic to this, so it wasn’t easy to dismiss. But I found it interesting that the engagement rate was over 9% and many of those comments were longer than the post itself.
The next was aimed at “Personal Branding” Evangelists:
Reputation Management is the Coke Classic of Personal Branding
This one didn’t perform nearly as well, and I’m not overly surprised. I’ve had lengthy debates over this one with fellow Marketing experts whom I respect.
It has certainly been adopted broadly, so perhaps it will remain a part of our lexicon in 2020.
But let me rephrase my objection another way…
When it comes to Personal Branding, you can keep the brand, I’ll keep the cow.
Next on my hit-list were “Mindset Coaches” and “Growth Hackers”. For this one, I opened the door for a little venting and I crowd-sourced for other terms people have grown tired of. My network did not disappoint. Here are a few I rather liked:
- #1 Bestseller
- Gary V says…
- Anything-Ninja
- Anything-Guru
- Influencer
- Authenticity
- Growth mindset vs. Fixed mindset
December 20, 2019, will mark the 100 year anniversary G.K. Chesterton said the following in the Illustrated London News.
“This is the age in which thin and theoretic minorities can cover and conquer unconscious and untheoretic majorities.”
I suspect this will prove truer today than it was 100 years ago and for a broader range of fields and subjects.”
Whether it be an accurate gauge of the zeitgeist or simply wishful thinking on my part, here’s to a year of declining rhetoric and a return to critical thinking.