Later Has a New Look: A Message From Our CEO

It’s official: Later has a new look. 

With a new logo, branding, and mission, we’re entering the next phase of our business. 

P.S. It’s Lyle here, Later’s CEO — a data geek, dog lover, and audiophile who’s spent the last decade specializing in influencer marketing and brand-building.

And today, I’m excited to share what’s to come for our community and customers — including how we plan to make Later the best tool in your marketing arsenal and a few predictions for the social marketing industry.

Why A Brand Refresh?

In 2022, Later was acquired by Mavrck, an industry-leading influencer marketing solution.

Now, after a year and a half together, we’re uniting to become one brand: under the Later banner. 

Why? 

We’re better together — one team, one logo, and one soon-to-be fully integrated platform with three flagship products: Later Social™, Later Influence™, and Later Link in Bio. 

And most importantly, one mission: to enable the world to make a living with their creativity.

This means building the first-ever Social Revenue Platform™: a one-stop shop for everything including social media management, influencer marketing, and link in bio tools.

Social media managers, influencer marketers, and creators will be able to:

• Partner on campaigns 

• Create and plan content 

• Analyze content performance

• Reach new audiences

• Drive clicks and engagement

• Generate ROI 

With so much competition on social media, it’s more important than ever for brands and creators to post content that resonates with their audience. 

Which is why it’s our mission to provide innovative solutions to help you build engaged communities, drive sales, and reach your goals.

Consider us your right hand. 

What Does This Mean for Existing (& New) Customers? 

The decision to become one brand was sparked by the opportunity to build a single destination for social marketers, influencer marketers, and creators. 

Our goal is to bring the best of both Mavrck and Later together — with the same expertise, industry knowledge, and level of service you expect. 

That said, here’s a quick explainer of what this brand refresh will mean for our customers: 

#1:  What’s Changing? 

As of today, Later will have a new logo and branding, along with new names for Later and Mavrck solutions:

• Later’s social media marketing tools will be renamed Later Social

• Mavrck’s enterprise influencer marketing platform will rebrand as Later Influence

• Later’s link in bio tool will be renamed Later Link in Bio (and is still 100% free)

#2:  What’s Not Changing? 

• Later’s Creator & Brand Collabs tool will continue to exist in Later Social

• Existing Mavrck customers’ contracts will stay the same 

#3: Will Later Become One Platform? 

• Our product team is currently working to build one unified platform, with a series of integrated tools and services to launch in the coming months. We’ll keep our community up-to-date with new features and product enhancements as they roll out! 

The Future of Social Marketing in 2024  

The social media space is constantly evolving, and while I don’t have a crystal ball, I’m beginning to see the tell-tale signs of a turn in the landscape.

Here are three important areas I've seen take momentum (and will keep a close eye) on:

• GenAI will continue to make content creation even easier. The rise of AI tools and features will enable even more people to enter the creator economy, while also inspiring more marketers to invest in their own social channels. 

• The removal of cookies by Google Chrome will shake up where marketers invest. We’ll see marketers invest more in tried-and-tested channels that have a deep understanding of the audiences they are reaching, such as search, social media and influencer marketing. This also means more earning potential for creators.

• Social media SEO will become more sophisticated: Social platforms continue to invest in search engine functionality as consumer engagement and behavior on their platforms continue to be driven more by communities with common interests versus social relationships.

But that’s not all the change I'm seeing. 

There’s no doubt that the landscape has drastically evolved since the early 2020s, meaning your strategy and investment need to change too. 

Let’s dive into three core areas that'll impact brands’ and creators' approach to social in 2024: 

Standing Out From the Crowd Will Be More Difficult (But Not Impossible) 

The net result of 2024 will be an even more crowded social and creator landscape.

In fact, by the end of this decade, I believe that one in ten people will be creating content — either for a company or their own personal brand. 

These content creators will show up in a multitude of ways, including part-time or full-time influencers, social media managers, agencies, brand ambassadors, employee advocates, or UGC creators. 

Which means there will be a lot more noise online.

So for content to stand out and perform, it needs to be human-driven, credible, and have an emphasis on storytelling, regardless of the medium or topic. 

This will ensure authenticity and trust remains at the center of your content.

Social and Influencer Marketing Need to Be Implemented Together 

The businesses that will thrive in 2024 will be those who understand the need to connect the dots between their social and influencer strategies.

Yet, too many brands still have separate teams, tools and measures of success for these two strategies.

Here at Later, our social and influencer teams sit together; frequently collaborating on creators to work with, content to publish or boost, and learnings that can inform each others’ strategies.  

The result? Less siloed teams; stronger results. 

Measurement and Monetization Takes Center Stage 

While followers, likes and views are nice-to-know, they no longer tell the full story, nor do they pay the bills. 

In 2024, it’s imperative to create goals and content for down-funnel metrics like engagement rate, click-through rate, referring link in bio traffic, and sales.

Monetization is the name of the game, and we’ll see more brands keep a closer eye on partnership performance, as well as creators branch out into new revenue streams like paid newsletters, content subscriptions, and affiliate commissions. 

Those who are more data-driven and lean into the full funnel — from social feed to cart — will succeed.

What’s Next for Later? 

Suffice to say, 2024 is set to be a big year for us and the customers we serve. 

We can’t wait to bring our vision to life and share more of it with you via our best-in-class content, resources, and products. Stay tuned! 

For even more social media and influencer marketing predictions, watch our free on-demand webinar with industry experts.