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Social Media Websites You Need to Know as a Business
Collected by Martin Brossman – (919) 847-4757 Facebook: http://BrossmanOnFB.com

Source: From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia http://en.wikipedia.org c2010 Wicipedia with exception of the inSideAreaCodes write up by Martin Brossman.  All these sites offer full service free levels of membership.

Social media are media for social interaction, using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques. Social media uses web-based technologies  to turn communication into interactive dialogues. Andreas Kaplan and Michael Haenlein define social media as “a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, which allows the creation and exchange of user-generated content.”[1] Businesses also refer to social media as consumer-generated media (CGM). Social media utilization is believed[who?] to be a driving force in defining the current time period as the Attention Age[citation needed]. A common thread running through all definitions of social media is a blending of technology and social interaction for the co-creation of value.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media

Facebook
is a social network service and website launched in February 2004 that is operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc.[1] As of July 2010[update] Facebook has more than 500 million active users,[6] which is about one person for every fourteen in the world.[7][N 1]  Users may create a personal profile, add other users as friends and exchange messages, including automatic notifications when they update their profile. Additionally, users may join common interest user groups, organized by workplace, school, or college, or other characteristics. The name of the service stems from the colloquial name for the book  given to students at the start of the academic year by university administrations in the US with the intention of helping students to get to know each other better. Facebook allows anyone who declares themselves to be at least 13 years old to become a registered user of the website.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook

Facebook Wall: A place where “Friends” and you can post comment, pictures, links or video. The idea came from the small bulletin board  outside many dorm rooms in college where you may post things or your friends can.

Twitter is a website, owned and operated by Twitter Inc., which offers a social networking and microblogging service, enabling its users to send and read other users’ messages called tweets. Tweets are text-based posts of up to 140 characters displayed on the user’s profile  page. Tweets are publicly visible by default, however senders can restrict message delivery to their friends list. Users may subscribe to other author tweets—this is known as following and subscribers are known as followers. As of late 2009, users can follow lists of authors instead of just following individual authors.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter

YouTube is a video-sharing website on which users can upload, share, and view videos. Three former PayPal employees created YouTube in February 2005.[3]    The company is based in San Bruno, California, and uses Adobe Flash Video technology to display a wide variety of user-generated video content, including movie clips, TV clips, and music videos, as well as amateur content such as video blogging and short original videos. Most of the content on YouTube has been uploaded by individuals, although media corporations including CBS, BBC, VEVO and other organizations offer some of their material via the site, as part of the YouTube partnership program.[4]   Unregistered users can watch the videos, while registered users are permitted to upload an unlimited number of videos. Videos that are considered to contain potentially offensive content are available only to registered users 18 and older. In November 2006, YouTube, LLC was bought by Google Inc. for $1.65 billion, and now operates as a subsidiary of Google.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Youtube

LinkedIn (pronounced /ˌlɪŋkt.ˈɪn/) is a business-oriented social networking site. Founded in December 2002 and launched in May 2003,[2] it is mainly used for professional networking. As of 9 August 2010, LinkedIn had more than 75 million registered users, spanning more than 200 countries and territories worldwide.[3] The site is available in English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish.[4] Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linkedin

inSideAreaCodes (first one was inSide919) is a free micro-business and small business networking site that lets businesses build business allies with other businesses in their area, grouped by their area code. It is 100% transparent to Google, allowing for a way to produce local content that can be viewed by anyone. This open system allows a business to increase its local web presence at no cost, but you must be a member to comment on a post. Since the people of a small business are often the best competitive advantage they have, inSideAreaCodes requires that you sign up under your real name and use a real picture (there is a separate place for your business name by your picture). All the inSideAreaCodes.com are built on the Ning platform (see following definition from Wickipedia). See http://www.inSideAreaCodes.com to find one near you or to see the founding group: http://www.inSide919.com

Ning is an online platform for people to create their own social networks,[3] launched in October 2005.[1] Ning was co-founded by Marc Andreessen and Gina Bianchini. Ning is Andreessen’s third company (after Netscape and Opsware). The word “Ning” is Chinese for “peace” (simplified Chinese: 宁; traditional Chinese: 寧; pinyin: níng), as explained by Gina Bianchini on the company blog.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ning_(website).

Connect with Martin Brossman on Facebook at http://BrossmanOnFB.com
Learn more about Small Business Training and Chambers of Commerce Trainning at www.SBCSpeakers.com or his Business training at www.ProNetworkingOnLine.com

Benefit for Directors of Small Business Centers and Students to be on Linkedin

October 20th, 2009 | Posted by martinbrossman in Linkedin | Small Business Center Directors - (Comments Off on Benefit for Directors of Small Business Centers and Students to be on Linkedin)

10 reason’s Directors of Small Business Center Directors and Students would benefit by being on Linkedin. – Martin Brossman

LinkedIn is a free resource that lets you build and maintain a global and local network. It is a powerful tool in a world where higher transparency is required for trust. It basically is a tool for solving business task. For the Directors of the Small Business Centers it directly increases the schools web presence while giving an easy way to share information with individuals in small and large industry. For Students and small business owners it has the same value and lets them learn from other professionals in business around the world. LinkedIn allows you to keep in touch with not only what people are doing but who they are connecting with. It is a social medium that is professional and businesslike. If you have not spent time with it and you care about your career and your clients’ trust, it’s time to start allotting some hours to it. Different from Facebook it is all business!

Here are just a few reasons to invest time in LinkedIn.com:

1. More than 50 Million people you can search.
LinkedIn lets you research 50+ million professional people with almost 100% accuracy and gives YOU permission to know the information posted on the profile. For example, if you met someone for the first time and mentioned you saw in their LinkedIn profile that they went to the same school you went to, that would build rapport. If you gained this information from a private paid database, that might make them feel uncomfortable.

2. Free quality consulting advice.
Use the Answers area of LinkedIn to obtain valuable free information as you need it—it’s often comparable to thousands of dollars of consulting advice. One way people are motivated to give you quality answers is because they have a chance of you voting their answer to you as the most useful answer increasing their status as an expert.

3. Establishing yourself as an expert.
Receiving authentic recommendations from past or present associates and co-workers which appear in your LinkedIn profile can help position you as an expert. Of course recommendations have to be earned by quality work, generally building over time to enrich your LinkedIn presence, and are often inspired by your giving sincere recommendation to others. At the same time, answering questions offers you a further opportunity to be seen as an expert by responding to questions posed in your field. When your answer reveals your expertise, you have the possibility of being voted “expert answer.”

4. Enhancing your brand and presence on the web.
LinkedIn is a site that builds more credibility than your own website. It is well-indexed by Google. When people see a recommendation given to you on LinkedIn, they can choose to see the full profile of the person that gave the recommendation, giving it more credibility.

5. Direct introductions to a large number of quality people.
Through LinkedIn you can be directly introduced to and have access to people who may not take your call directly. By properly using LinkedIn’s direct introduction system, you can get introduced to people that you are connected to as well as people that your contacts are connected to. You can also learn who your contacts are connected to, and how they are connected. Important note: When you make the reach to contact them, always have a reason in their best interest.

6. Allowing people to prescreen YOU to build faster trust.
With higher demands for greater transparency, LinkedIn offers a credible way for your customers to prescreen you by seeing recommendations without having to bother people. This also applies for people looking for a job. People can see recommendations to you without your having to repeatedly bother your references to pre-screen you.

7. Professional groups that let you connect with a common interest.
Connect with people that share a common interest by joining a group and participating in group discussions on the group’s discussion board. There is a group for everyone, such as local networking groups like Linking Raleigh, NC, school and corporate alumni groups, or groups related to an industry or profession.

8. Providing valuable changing resources to attract multiple visits to your information.
Use the LinkedIn applications to do things like display your WordPress or TypePad blog in your profile so that visitors can learn more about you. Add the Amazon book app so you can share with others what you are reading and recommend they read. Promote your events or find an event through the events app. Make a presentation by uploading a PowerPoint slide show about your business or even yourself.

9. The ability to recognize good people that the world can see.
LinkedIn lets you give recommendations to people throughout your entire life, and that can be a better use of your time then the usual mode of interrupting people to ask for a job or a sale. LinkedIn not only allows you to build trust and credibility with local people but people all over the world. Since you can search in your vicinity or anywhere, you can have local contacts and global ones very easily. By providing deeper information, LinkedIn can enhance existing relationships and deepen new ones. Spending some of your time appreciating good people in your life is the avenue to fostering friends and associates who care about YOU.

10. Keeping track of your direct and indirect network.
Use LinkedIn as an easy way to keep track of your contacts, their contacts, and changes in status. For example, if someone you know got promoted or received an award, this could by a way to acknowledge them for their accomplishment. You may find that a good friend wanting to help you just connected with an important person you want to meet.

Like anything in life, you do have to spend some time with LinkedIn to gain value from it. The time you spend building your profile will reap its return when you put yourself out there to expand your professional network and build your reputation through this rapidly expanding social media tool. Simply by sending and receiving recommendations, using apps, answering and asking questions, and helping others along the way, you can be remembered and made memorable by using LinkedIn. Take full advantage of what LinkedIn has provided for free and bring yourself to the forefront of a crowded room.

To learn more about SBCSpeakers and see all the training for Small Business Centers of Community Colleges and Chambers of Commerce: http://www.ncsmallbusinesstraining.com
or all of the Success Coaching, Training and Consultant with Martin Brossman at: http://www.ProNetworkingOnLine.com

About the contributors of this article Martin & Greg:

-Hello, I am Martin Brossman. As a success coach, I believe almost everyone should be on LinkedIn since it has given so much value to myself and to my coaching clients when they spend the right amount of time with it. If you Google my name in quotes, you will see the second item listed is my LinkedIn profile–all possible with the free LinkedIn service. I currently use their paid service, but that evolved after I gained value from the basic free service. (Our post above refers to all that is possible with the free service.) I have been offering group LinkedIn training in the Triangle since 2006, and in response to requests, I now offer customized LinkedIn training for individuals and small groups. My LinkedIn profile: http://www.LinkedIn.com/in/martinbrossman

-Hello I am Greg Hyer. As a local networking advocate, I feel strongly that LinkedIn is the ideal tool and service to use to enhance your professional brand and manage your professional relationships. The benefits to using LinkedIn are significant, yet it does not require that you devote that much time to it. As a founder of a LinkedIn Group and corresponding website, LinkingRaleighNC.com, I help local professionals build a quality network and provide some resources to improve their chances of finding the connection for the next opportunity. My LinkedIn profile: http://www.LinkedIn.com/in/greghyer