What social media has done to us…

2 things i hated... but did the most in 2009

a. Facebook

b. Twitter

But now i just love them.. (twitter takes the 1st position)

so where are they heading for...

Facebook crossed the 350 million mark..every day users spend 8 billion mins. on fb \,post 45 mil status updates..i actually contribute 120 mins.. :) n u??

So what does it hold for marketers??

Well if u want to promote urself ... be out there on facebook.. even a small restaurant can advertise there n reach out to it's target audience.. for as low as 1$ a day..

it gives you a platform whre the customer reach out to you .. n can have a meaningful converstation.. so hey u CEO do create a page out there on fb n start connecting wth ur customers at a personal level..

well facebook is on a roll...worldwide spending on Facebook is expected to reach $435 million in 2009 and $605 million in 2010..

n Twitter has been on a steady rise..it has had more than 7 billion tweets .. check the real-time figures on http://popacular.com/gigatweet/

but there has been some sort of stagnation in twitters growth http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/12/22/the-world-is-flat-for-twitter-as-in-global-growth-has-stalled/

n it is a tough road ahead for twitter in terms of makin money,,

they must definitely look at creating their own applications.. n can earn revenue thorough ads when one goes on the application page... i definitely not recommend ads on the user pages..

there are zillions of applications out there based on twitter... so it's far better that twitter itself monetize the opportunities that lay in front of it...

but y do we spend soo much time on these sites...

well for me i use fb to play games...first it was poker... nw cafe world n stuff..

i rarely use it to intreact wth people...(thou undoubtedly itz the place if i wanna check someone out or reach out to)

n i use twitter to search n knw more abt the things i like... (i have almost stopped using google, blv me)

nw I don have to even login to techcrunch or google blog .. or nasa’s blog

.. I just get updated through twitter n if something interest’s me i just go on tha link..

actually some of the saddest news I heard was thru fb n twitter..

RIP MJ … n RIP Asheem da

Okay so yes twitter keeps me updated .. what’s more to offer??

Well use the search..

U knw .. try n search for mundane things like office furniture n u'll find :

a. people willing to give away furniture for free...NGO's can use this

b. people wondering from where n what furniture to buy.. co.'s can use this

go try out something really crazy .. n do share that with me..

was surprised myself to see that 90% co.'s promoting there hardware stuff like hand tools , garden tools etc. wre from India.. n they actually got leads...

I actually got to knw the abt a restaurant in Delhi which serves some of the best Indian cuisine .. from a German guy who had tweeted abt it..

when i don use them(fb n twitter) for work... i use them for fun...

n this"fun" tha i get out of them is wha keeps me hooked...

The other thing I really used on the net was stumbleupon …

Itz just wow… try it people.. it let’s u see the sites ..the webpages .. on the topics which interest u .. n u’ll get to see some amzin relevant stuff which otherwise you wouldn’t have come across on the net,, no amount of googling can yield the same results..

So 2009 has been an interesting year.. n ya social media sites have changed a lot… for the better… now let’s see what’s in store for us in 2010…