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The Most Popular Social Media Sites

In our article entitled, "Social Media Marketing," we introduced what all this social media stuff is and why you should get in on it. Here, we're going to point you toward the most popular social media websites and describe what you can do once you get there.

Twitter. Twitter is by far, the most popular social media website to date even though it began later than two of the second most prominent channels. Twitter provides the opportunity to communicate with the likes of followers, a group of consumers, fans, or anyone who chooses to "follow" a company. What makes this site particularly appealing is its simplicity. In 140 characters or less, you can talk about whatever strikes your fancy. If your followers like what you have to say, they'll in turn, share your message with their own collection of followers. In this regard, you can consider Twitter as an electronic word-of-mouth tool.
Facebook. Facebook is the second most popular social media website even though it started much earlier than Twitter. Like Twitter, Facebook gives companies the opportunity to interact with a group of consumers, fans, or anyone who chooses to "connect" with a company. But unlike Twitter, Facebook provides a slightly bigger text box to communicate and it offers a lot more functionality. Twitter is a very simple text-based word-of-mouth tool. Facebook on the other hand gives companies the opportunity to share photos, videos, and files. It even provides access to "apps" or web scripts that enable additional interactivity such as live chat.
MySpace. MySpace is the third most popular social media website. It was one of the first social media scenes to hit the net, and it too, offers more functionality than both Twitter and Facebook. MySpace gives companies the opportunity to interact with a group of consumers, fans, or anyone who chooses to "become friends" with a company. It also gives companies the opportunity to not only share photos, videos, and files (just like with Facebook), but blog as well.

There are tons more social media sites available and each one seems to appeal to a particular group of people for any number of reasons. There are so many of these types of sites, it can be an all day event to keep up with them all. As you peruse your options, look at some of the software developed to help manage your accounts at these things. Through a single interface, you can blast a message to the sites described above and about a hundred more. Social media is a fun approach to keeping in touch with your customers. The key to making it work is to let your messages consume your fans. Just don't let the opportunity consume you or all your time.

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