The trendy thing to do as of late has been to openly hate sites like Facebook and Twitter on other niche areas of the web, mostly having to do with privacy issues, most of which could honestly be avoided through responsible use of the internet. The fact of the matter is, the majority of people love to use these sites, and will check them SEVERAL times a day. There once was a time where you had to look something up on yellow pages. This evolved into looking places up online on Google. What we're seeing here is the next evolution in that process.
Do you like Miracle Whip? Like Miracle Whip on Facebook. Do you shop at Old Navy? Follow Old Navy on Twitter. With the rate that new people are joining up with these sites, and the amount of time spent on said sites on a daily basis, businesses are starting to have a presence in social media on the internet. Ways to profit from social media can be found all over the place, and businesses both big and small are starting to make the leap on this bandwagon, BIG TIME. With Twitter and the like being just a cellphone app away, its not hard for a business to have some presence on the internet, and grow at a rapid pace simply because it's so easy to remind you that they're there all the time.
Social Media is not the enemy. It's a tool whose usefulness increases by the day. The more and more time and energy people pump into it, the more powerful it becomes. Keep your eyes on the prize, it won't be long until you can start asking the Burger King questions on Formspring.
[dequeue]
credit for the image above goes to user "Boris Veldhuijizen Van Zaten" at Flickr
