First Friday: The January Edition
Before we jump in, let’s all take a moment to hold space for the lyrics of Defying Gravity.
Welcome to First, er…Second Friday, Adverb’s monthly newsletter where we bring you the latest on social media trends, alongside some of our shenanigans.
Trending Lifestyle Audios
The 2024 Season Comes to an End
Looking to make a video that recaps your 2024? This trend is for you!
This audio starts with an announcer saying, “And with that, the 2024 season comes to a close.” The rest of this minute-long audio is a mashup of uplifting songs that create a sense of wanderlust in the listener.
The best part about this audio is that we’ve seen it used by all different types of content creators and influencers, who have used it to sum up their year of travel, business accomplishments, or even their favourite restaurants of the year!
This trending audio is a remixed version of the song “Home” by Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros. This version is sung in a higher octave and it is a bit sped-up—giving it the quality of many popular Instagram reel videos.
With a lighthearted audio like this one, it’s perfect for a wide variety of content. On top of general lifestyle content, it is being used by small businesses, motivational influencers, and artists.
Trending Comedic Audios
This TikTok trend uses the song “Send My Love” by Adele and only requires a little bit of dancing.
These videos start with the line leading up to the chorus of the song, with text on the screen that says “dance if you…” with users filling in the second half of the sentence. At first, the person in the video shakes their head, disagreeing with the text and they start to walk off. However, as soon as the chorus starts they come back into the frame and start to dance.
Common video topics for this trend relate to relationships or clothing, while others get a bit more specific, like this one about wanting to see people’s Christmas hauls.
This audio comes from this scene in the live-action Alice in Wonderland movie and users on TikTok are using it to re-create moments when someone says a really weird or outrageous thing after you spoke.
From jokes about relationships to everyone’s love of Jellycat, this trend is all about creating something that your audience can relate to: the times in life when someone has tried to dismiss our interests or feelings — but in a humorous sort of way.
Wicked Craze
The movie Wicked came out at the end of November and throughout December people on social media could NOT stop talking about it! On top of all the praise the film received, we even saw a several different trends emerge that were somehow related to it!
“Holding Space for Defying Gravity”
This trend comes from a 30-second interview clip that was done during the Wicked press tour. The interviewer told Cynthia Erivo that some people are “Taking the lyrics of ‘Defying Gravity’ and really holding space with that, and feeling power in that.”
The moment gets a little weird after that—Erivo reacts in a way that would make you think she wrote the song, and Ariana Grande goes to hold just one of her fingers in support.
Users on social media quickly took the awkward moment and ran with it, turning the phrase, “holding space for defying gravity,” into a meme, sharing videos of how they are doing their part to hold space, like this person in a parking lot, or in elevators.
“Popular”
One of the other well-known songs from Wicked is “Popular,” so it should come as no surprise that a part of that song also became a social media trend. In the movie version, there is a part when Galinda, A.K.A. Ariana Grande, sings, “Don’t make me laugh, they were…” and Elphaba interrupts to finish the sentence with the word “Popular.” After being interrupted, Galinda very excitedly exclaims, “RIGHT!”
People started to use this clip to share those relatable moments when you quickly bond with someone who is thinking the exact same thing as you. For example, the feeling when someone understands a reference you make, or when someone agrees with your hot take on Thanksgiving dishes.
“Dear Galinda”
This next Wicked trend comes from the song “What is this Feeling?” The clip being used for this trend features Galinda walking out of a building in a rather dramatic fashion while carrying books. Around her, the other students sing about how good of a person she is.
Two different types of trending content emerged from this song! The first turned the footage of Galinda into a CapCut template, letting users add their own background and text to the purposeful, dramatic walk, like this example.
The second trend requires a little more effort from the creator as people started to recreate the dance moves. These videos ranged from people walking down hallways to other professional dance crews or broadway stars filming their own version.
Adverb’s Emoji Ins and Outs
At the start of the year, it’s important to reflect on what things we want to keep doing, what to leave behind, and what things we should change. Here at Adverb, our reflection comes in the style of emojis.
After realizing that the thumbs up emoji 👍 has different meanings for the different generations in our workplace, we got to work on brainstorming on what we could use instead.
See what we’re predicting as the hot new emojis of 2025 over on our Instagram.
Thanks for joining us for this year's first First Friday on the second Friday. Stay tuned for next month when we’ll really share First Friday on the First Friday!
Your friends 🫘,
Adverb.
