Should Arts Organizations Follow Social Media Trends?
Are "trending audios" too casual for the arts? Should orchestras post memes?
These are fair questions, and the answer is: it depends on who you're trying to reach.
I see a lot of arts organizations jumping on social media trends. When done well, following a trend signals that your organization is paying attention — that you're current, alive, in the conversation. Relevance is always worth pursuing.
The problem is when the trend isn't relevant to your target audience. Social media algorithms are incredibly good at customizing each person's feed to their specific interests and behaviors. A 60-year-old's Instagram looks nothing like a 30-year-old's, unless they happen to share extremely similar tastes. So a meme that fills your marketing team's feeds may be completely foreign to the audience you're actually trying to reach.
Trends, memes, and trending audio are just like age-specific slang: use the wrong ones with the wrong people, and you'll get confused looks at best, eye-rolls at worst.
Here's what I've noticed: organizations that spend a lot of time chasing trends often haven't clearly defined what they want from social media in the first place. The creatives running the account (typically Millennials or Gen Z) are naturally drawn to the content that fills their own feeds. That's not a criticism; it's human nature. But without a clear framework and goals, social media planning starts to sound like: "You know that trend in the reel I sent you? I think we could do something like that!" Everyone gets excited, brainstorming begins, and the actual communication goals get lost.
Before your team starts workshopping how to jump on a trend, check the following:
Who are we trying to reach with this post?
Are our recent posts actually reaching our target audience? (Look at your recent numbers.)
What do we want those people to do—buy a ticket, follow us, visit the website? Can we achieve these goals using this trend?
If a trend clears some or all of those hurdles, go for it. One of my favorite ways to pressure-test a trend’s relevance is to ask people who fit your target demographic (and who are active on social media) if they've heard of it. If you get a lot of blank looks, skip it.
A fair amount of the trend-chasing in the arts is just a stab in the dark. Teams are hoping to go viral in a general sense. Occasionally it works, and they attract a new demographic. But when too many posts don’t make sense to the core audience, you risk alienating the people you need the most.
Going viral is a nice bonus. Communicating with your audience is the job.