OC-IT

The use of social media by companies to connect with their customers and drive brand awareness is commonplace among companies of all sizes. Using a site like Facebook and its numerous features allows small businesses to tap into a potentially large customer base.

One thing is clear, quality is still more important than quantity. Especially with the current economic downturn, people are downsize everything – including online social circles. November 17, 2010 was declared by Jimmy Kimmel during his television show as “National Unfriend Day”, the opportunity for all Facebook users to declutter their Facebook pages by “unfriending” people in their friends’ lists

These days, 140 characters can mean a lot. But the value of what you put in Twitter depends largely on how you manage your Twitter-ing. Here are a few tips to help you start on the right path.

While Foursquare is technically a game, dismissing its use for your business could be a big mistake. The potential for this location-based social networking service is vast, and it might just be the thing that puts you on the map – and we don’t just mean literally. If you thought you’ve seen it all in the social networking world – Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, and other wildly popular social networking websites – take a look at Foursquare.

Consider this:  according to research by technology analyst group Gartner , beyond 2010 end users, not the IT department, will be responsible for 50 percent of business IT procurement decisions—ultimately bringing and running their own systems on company networks. Meanwhile, according to management consultants Accenture , around one-third  of today’s new generation of workers (a group they call “millenials”) not only want to use the computer of their choice at work, but also want control of the applications they use too.

Twitter , the microblogging service used by CNN , Oprah and none other than President Obama seems to have taken the world by storm, and is fast becoming an indispensable tool for many small and midsized businesses as well Twitter allows company owners to share short “tweets” or posts a maximum of 140 characters each to give quick, live updates to “followers” on the Twitter service. A few days ago, the Wallstreet Journal published an interesting article on how Twitter has become a life saver for many business owners in a crisis .

These days it seems like everybody is talking about “social networking” and using websites such as MySpace , Facebook , and Twitter . But exactly what is social networking? Is it just a passing fad or is it an idea whose time has come and is here to stay?  More importantly, can it be put to good use in your business?