by: John Bernhoft - President 

This question is starting to resonate in marketing meetings across the country as the internet steadily becomes more of a necessity than acommodity. However, in spite of its prevalence in our society, the percentage of businesses aware of social media is still fairly low. There is not only a technology barrier involved, but an age gap. Social media, also called Web 2.0, is an evolutionary sector spawned through the internet primarily by college students and youth, hence the age gap. Business owners today may feel like they have the internet well in hand. They understand the web, email, and ecommerce.  However, just when they thought they had mastered the technology around them, new trends made it speed by at light speed.  If you find yourself in that group ,don’t feel too bad. Even technology “geeks” in their 30s and 40s have been caught by surprise and are grappling to fully understand this phenomenon.

Social media already has powerful marketing capabilities.  Products and services are being marketed through the viral nature of this network every minute of everyday. If your business has customers or is seeking customers that are using social media, you will need to understand this network, or hire someone to manage it for you. It will become an evolution of your overall web strategy.

Facebook and Myspace have taken the teenage population by storm for the past several years, and have led the way in developing the social media space. You adapted, broke down, and yes, created your own Facebook page.   You smiled, as you thought you were now up to date on the new technology.  Don’t get too comfortable though, because now you must begin to tweet on Twitter from the tweet deck, post photos to Flickr, and Digg your blogs. The bottom line is technology is always changing, and as soon as you adjust to the nuances of Web2.0, Web 3.0 will start to loom on the horizon.  Remember that a mere 15 years ago the internet did not exist for all but universities and the military. How did business function without email in 1994? I scarcely remember.

360 Direct is riding the technological storm and partnering with Sohobiztube, a visionary in the social media space. Prior to Sohobiztube,the social media scene was devoted to promoting the individual, and businesses had to adapt this personal technology to their corporate needs. Sohobiztube is a new web portal created for business that allows an organization to create a professional presence and bring a company’s organizational chart to the new media.  Find out more about what 360 Direct is doing to bring together your business and cutting edge technology at http://www.sohobiztube.com.

Subscribe to our RSS feed for this blog, and the 360 Directteam will lead you through the morass of Web 2.0.