We at Opus Communication keep an in-depth look into the Digital world, what new trends are coming up, which social media network is gaining user share etc.

In Pakistan’s Social Media industry, Twitter is the new comer, the young and innovative platform, but is Facebook ready to retire yet? Facebook is almost ten years old now, and although it makes regular changes, is it really that exciting to use? If we look at it closely it basically has the same old features since we signed up years ago. We cannot deny the fact that most of us understand how to use it now and it’s great platform to keep up to date with all our friends and family, but really is it anything more? Is it really as innovative as we once thought it was?

Within the past few months, I find myself turning to twitter to share my thoughts or spread the word of recent news. Because its serves the purpose of expressing our thoughts in 140 characters at a time and because twitter is cleaner, simple and yet so much more fun!

For us at Opus, Every time we log on to twitter something has changed, new hash tags are trending, new topics are found. This leads us to look into why they are trending and in turn gives our content team an insight of what is about to go viral.

In the west, Twitter was once considered Facebook’s little brother, twitter has recently caught up in terms of users, but is it ready to take over?

Deploying your brand on Social Media is essential. Whether your business is B2B or you manage small local brand, social media is important! Social media in Pakistan went big in 2013 but is set to be even bigger in 2014, especially for businesses. Many brands have put a lot of effort into their company’s social media campaigns by making experimenting it in house, which is why they some of their efforts are wasted.

Most of the companies will have both Facebook and Twitter company accounts, and both take a lot of time to set up and maintain. We’d recommend you to give your Social Media out to the Professionals, who will do all the efforts and manage them effectively and efficiently and provide you best value for money.

The beauty of Twitter is to reach targeted users to gain maximum interest in your brand, and let’s not forget the power of hash tags!

Twitter is set to become even bigger in 2014, and we predict that it still has some time to takeover Facebook, but will be an influential tool for B2B and B2C companies.

Apple took only five years to become America’s largest music retailer, and seven to become the world’s largest. In eighteen short months, Google erased 85% of the Market capitalization of the top GPS companies by launching its mobile app Google Maps. Alibaba, Chinese look alike of Amazon, became a $16 billion lender in less than three years, and China’s largest seller of money market mutual funds in only seven months.

Companies seem to be venturing into new industries for growth with increasing regularity policies. In a survey by Accenture, 60 percent of executives said their company intends to make alliances, joint ventures or  willing to make acquisitions over the next five years.

This represents a big challenge to the global banking industry where, in developed markets, growth and profitability are still at about half of pre-crisis levels. As banks recover from the downturn or better known as the Global Recession of 2009, non-banks are taking advantage by proceeding aggressively with digital innovations and gaining more and more of the banking value chain. Accenture in its survey also estimates that this competition between non-banks and traditional banks revenue has the potential to erode one-third of traditional banks revenue by 2020.

Payments, which are almost one-fourth of traditional banks revenue, are one of the most fought after areas. PayPal has become the number one online payment method in some countries (unfortunately not available in Pakistan), and start-ups like Square and Stripe are already earning multi-billion dollar valuations by analysts. Retailers are moving in as well and they are fast: almost one-third of local Starbucks revenues in United States are paid through their own loyalty cards. Stonage Jeans Co, Junaid Jamshed, K&N’s Gloria Jeans Coffee are examples of earning revenues via such loyalty cards in Pakistan.

T-Mobile introduced a new checking service by the use of a smartphone app and ATM card in January 2014. Google launched its plastic debit card for its Google Wallet in November 2013. Walmart has teamed up with American Express to commence a prepaid card that is functionally a debit account; it took the stage by adding more than a million customers in less than a year. In 2009, Telenor Pakistan partnered with Tameer Micro Finance Bank to introduce branchless banking for the first time in the country.

Technology giants, telecommunication companies, and retailers have to struggle against banks, if they compete to product-for-product and service-for-service, and many analysts believe that regulatory barriers will dampen disruption. New entrants already are a threat to banks by raising their service expectations levels and creating distance between the banks and their customers.

The risk for these banks is that new competitors will are dragging them to a limited role as back-office utility, while non-banks are trying to become the new face of their customers’ financial lives.

Banks cannot respond to these threats by simply becoming “more digital,”— closing down branches and rolling out better mobile applications and online banking services is not the right plan B. If they want to defend their turf against the Googles and PayPals of the world, they themselves must move further into the commercial lives of their customers. They must learn to play a greater role not just at the moment of financial transactions but before and afterwards as well.

Banks likely possess competitive advantages in the digital world. They have large customer bases; vast amounts of customer information and transaction data.

Instead of simply enabling customers to save money and pay for things, banks have the potential to combine their vast transaction data with new digital tools to help customers make better decisions on what to buy, and where and when to buy it – whether it’s dinner and a movie or a new home. Muslim Commercial Bank recently took their step by introducing MCB Lite the world’s 1st socially connected Mobile Wallet.

As the lines between industries blur all around, financial services will take on new dimensions in the minds of consumers. To be a profitable sector, banks cannot simply rely on providing accounts and access to funds. The future of the industry will depend on its ability to provide services that help customers save and better manage money in their everyday lives.