Social Media in the Real World of Everyday Business

Most of you should know I am a true believer in the use of social media and online collaboration tools as the future of your business. But because I spend so much time thinking about it, I am certain I can be a droning noise to family and friends.

The truth is the only opinions that will matter about the importance of your use of social media is your customer's and potential customer's. So what does the "average person" get from social media?

Kipp Bodnar had a great posting yesterday about social media and the real world. You can read it for yourself at Digital Capitalism .

Here is some of Kipp's post...

"So what do people want from social applications (which for most of the people was Facebook)? They want to reconnect with people, to understand the major changes in peoples lives since they last saw them. People wan to know about the big stuff: vacations, kids, job changes, moves, deaths and they other major events that fill our lives. This reconnection is how most people want to use the social web today."


"The one thing that people love about social media even if they don't know they are using it is discovering new things. Discovery is the common ground across the entire group of people I spent time with of the holidays. People want ways to discover new things and this isn't new, but this does drive main stream adoption. Think about most of the mainstream social applications: Facebook, Digg, Amazon, Flickr and StumbleUpon.com they all facilitate discovery and that is why people love them. Most of the people I listened to are completely in love with Amazon's recommendations feature both online and via e-mail."

As you start thinking about how you will use all the great social tools to better connect with your customers you should keep Kipp's thoughts in the forefront of you mind.