Is Discord a peek into the future of social media?
+how blogs bring value to your brand website and the cultural moments | news that caught our attention this week
quick summary ⚡️
Discord has grown to 150 million monthly users, and there’s a lot of opportunity
Why a blog [yesss a blog] is still good to maintain for your brand
How Spotify builds Spotify Wrapped each year, Substack is expanding to video and more in the cultural moments and news that caught our attention this week
A a little inspo / reminder to get you through the holiday season
here’s what Discord tells us about the future of social media
Kait Richmond is a writer, producer and contributor to the M.T. Deco Blog
We all know fashion trends are circular, and it turns out that Internet trends are, too.
Back when people were first wearing 90s fashion staples like overalls or baggy jeans, they were also starting to connect with friends online through message boards and AOL Instant Messenger (better known to millennials as AIM). MySpace eventually came around and brought about the start of social media as we know it today, with public profiles, friends, photo sharing and more.
Building public digital personas became the norm, but we’re at a point where people are looking to get back to basics, and also get back some privacy. Which brings us to the circularity: while apps like Instagram and TikTok are still incredibly popular, others that focus more on text and offer some privacy are on the rise.
Today’s example is Discord, a messaging service that bills itself as “the easiest way to talk over voice, video and text.” When it was founded in 2015, it was a tool for gamers to chat with each other while they played games, and after. Users liked it for its voice and video chat features, over alternatives like Skype. [Read this piece from Protocol for a good overview of Discord’s first five years.]
We don’t mean to say Discord is an up and coming service. Fast Company reports that Discord has 150 million monthly active users, and that it wants to be the modern day AIM. There’s also the recent news that Meta-owned WhatsApp is introducing new, Discord-like features. That means there is so much opportunity, but for a variety of reasons, it hasn’t broken through to be thought of among the traditional social media platforms - yet.
Part of that is probably because Discord was started by gamers, for gamers. It’s had bursts of popularity with other communities - it was a huge space for the crypto crowd at one point - but it still seems to be the biggest with the gaming community, including some of those creators who use it to complement their presence on Twitch.
What’s also interesting about Discord is the company’s transparency with improvements it’s making. The Verge reported recently that instead of banning users who violate community guidelines, Discord aims to “reform” them. And the Fast Company article touches on how Discord has announced updates aimed at making it faster, safer and easier to use, including that its design is updated “on a rolling basis.”
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“While X and Meta’s Facebook and Instagram serve pay-to-play and algorithmically delivered content to make money by showing users ads, Discord is ‘not an ad platform,’ says Cherry Park, the company’s director of product marketing. ‘We don’t sell any user data. That’s not how we make money.’ Instead, almost all of its revenue comes from its Nitro benefits for paid users.”
Discord isn’t the only platform specializing in these text-heavy chat features. Reddit has been around for a long time but is only growing in popularity, especially as people turn away from Google and use Reddit and TikTok as search tools. Slack has also expanded into the corporate version of Discord; you don’t just need to be on your company’s channel - there are plenty of professional groups that allow people to do digital networking.
TLDR; we’re not saying you need to jump to add Discord or any of its counterparts to your digital strategy [just yet!], but you should, at a minimum, be aware of them and the trends toward privacy and text. Many of Discord’s 150 million monthly users are teenagers, and anyone looking to build brand love and community with a group that will soon have a lot of purchasing power needs to meet the customers where they are.
more on the MTD blog
🗣️every business should have a blog 🗣️
Why? First and foremost, blogs increase visibility. They’re also platforms you can control (AKA not subject to algorithm changes or the whims of billionaire owners). And, they’re the 🎁 that keeps on giving: investing some time in meaningful blog content gives you even more options to post on your social accounts.
The most important thing to remember is that all blog posts must serve your audience information they need to know, something that adds value to their lives. Produce good content that you would consume yourself and use that as your last check before you hit publish. (And no, you don’t have to be a writer to do it - you just have to be willing to share your unique POV.)
If you’re not sure what to post to your blog, here are some ideas to get you started:
Your story - Tell us about you, how the company came about and the journey you took to create it. Another bonus with this is that personalization is often the differentiator between competitors.
Case study - There’s no better way to demonstrate the value your company brings than to highlight a specific client and their success story. Break it down by the challenge, the process and results.
React to articles - A very easy way to keep your site fresh is to highlight articles related to your industry and then react to them.
more about the *why* and get some writing prompts for the *how* on the MTD blog x once you have your blog, head to the MTD blog for next steps
💎cultural gems💎
The cultural moments and news that caught our attention this week:
Are you a Cambridge, a Berkeley, or a Burlington? (The Cut). Happy Spotify Wrapped Season to all who celebrate! This year Spotify created “Sound Towns,”using users’ data to match them with “a city based on your listening and artist affinity.”
More on the art of the Spotify playlist on the MTD blog
Newsletter platform Substack takes aim at YouTube (Washington Post). Substack is rolling out new video and editing tools allowing creators to publish video podcasts, create interactive AI-generated transcripts and customize shareable clips to cross-post across social platforms.
More on how newsletters can help power your digital strategy on the MTD blog
Commit to kindness at work (LinkedIn). “Being kind doesn’t only benefit the people around you; research shows it also benefits your own mental health.”
Is LinkedIn the “TikTok” for business? (Gary Vaynerchuk). “LinkedIn’s organic reach is something that I think everyone under leverages on this day.”
inspo
Despite the craziness that this time of year brings, take a moment to center yourself 🍃
