From WeChat to wearables: 2014/15 will show whether several new digital phenomena can prevail and to what extent companies can benefit from them. Social media experts from Germany and China comment on the most important digital trends of the year. This month, Stephan Mayer speaks with Sandro Günther from Berlin about RTB, Google+, and the social photo sharing service The Fancy, among other things.

I work as

Managing director at Werbeboten Media, a social media agency with offices in Berlin and Leipzig. I mainly take care of strategy and conception.

I first came into contact with social media

In 2006.

I give the following advice to business partners

 For me personally, there is no “if or not” when it comes to using social media. Nevertheless, every company must first be sure and aware of why social networks should be used and develop an appropriate strategy before implementing it.
– Facebook is not the only social network, even if it is by far the largest. It should be critically examined and evaluated which social network is the right one. Less is often more.
– Social media is not free: Even if a company presence on Facebook or Twitter is free, it still requires human resources that should be trained and a budget for conception, marketing individual content, and helpful tools in the areas of content, monitoring, and analytics.

The development that has surprised me most in recent years is

that Facebook has made the step into a mobile world and is an excellent performance channel.
…that Google+ still has so little presence.

You will find me at the following conferences (trade fairs, meetings) this year

All Facebook Conference in Munich, Berlin Web Week, dmexco in Cologne, and certainly a few more.

These social networks will play a particularly important role in 2014/15

Facebook, because it is increasingly being used as a performance channel, and the question of integrating WhatsApp is still unresolved.
Foursquare, because we have already had good experiences with it and there are interesting use cases.
For Google+, it will be interesting to see whether it can gain users and importance. This is closely linked to SEO measures: the more impact Google+ has on search results, the more effort companies will make to be present there.
The development of smaller networks and providers with great potential, such as The Fancy or Pinterest, will be exciting. Who will prevail? Will some of these networks disappear?

For me, the three most important social media trends for 2014/15 are

 Big data, as obvious as that may sound.
The type of advertising will change in connection with mobile marketing. The keywords here are RTB and native ads, which will become increasingly important in connection with social media.
And one more thing: Content is and will remain king. This is not a trend but should be the standard for all players!