With the silly season almost upon us it’s time to dust off the old crystal ball and have a bit of fun with some predictions about what’s in store for 2012. Apart from the world ending (yet again!) according to the Mayan Calendar, 2012 is set to usher in even more disruption via social, local and mobile technologies.

 

According to Forrester Research founder George Colony 2012 will see the rise of the App Internet – where powerful in-cloud services are transmitted down to PCs, tablets and servers. His talk at Le Web in Paris titled “Three Social Thunderstorms” talked about 1) The death of the Web & the approach of the App Internet, 2) How social is saturated, and 3) That Enterprise Social is the next big opportunity. You can watch Colony’s talk here on YouTube.

Marketing Strategist David Meerman Scott thinks “Big Data” will play an increasingly important role in marketing next year: “Data has been with us for a long time, but it is only recently that marketers are realizing they need sophisticated tools to harness that data and make sense and use of it. As a result, marketing departments will add a new job function that will play a role similar to that of bond traders in financial institutions in that they will rely on instant, real-time data to make informed decisions.”

Angel investor Ron Conway sees “Collaborative Consumption” as trend to watch in 2012: “There is a growing movement of people who are more interested in renting and not buying: accessing and not owning. At the same time, entrepreneurs are using technology and social insights to create trusted communities for these new peer-to-peer marketplaces. The flagship example of this movement is Airbnb, which builds a market around renting one’s living space. Other examples are ZipCar and Rentcycle, which are applying technology to facilitate the distribution of high-cost items.”

Next year is certainly set to be another amazing year for social marketing and we can’t wait to help your business navigate through this exciting landscape. What other 2012 predictions have you come across?