A couple of days ago, my partner and I attended an informative seminar on the impact of Social Media. We went because, like many, we are not sure if this phenomenon is a fad or the biggest paradigm shift since the  Industrial Revolution. And, if it is a paradigm shift, how can it best be used to further our business.
Consider some interesting statics.

-  This year, Gen Y out numbers baby boomers and 96% of them have joined
a social network.
-  The number of years to reach 50 Million: Radio – 38 yrs; TV – 13 yrs;
Internet – 4 yrs: Face Book achieved 100 million in less than 9-months;
iPod app downloads hit 1-billion in 9 months.
-  As this article is being written, some 100+ hours of video will be uploaded
to YouTube.
-  25% of search results for the world’s top 20 largest brands are links to
use-generated content.
-  There are over 200,000,000 blogs and 54% of bloggers post content or
Tweet daily.
-  34% of bloggers post opinions about products and brands.
-  78% trust peer recommendations…..only 14% trust advertisements.
-  Only 18% of traditional TV campaigns generate a positive ROI.
-  Ashton Kucher and Ellen DeGeneres have more Twitter followers than the
entire population of Ireland, Norway, Panama and Israel.
-  If FaceBook were a country, it would be the fourth largest behind the U.S.,
India and China.

These were just a few of the statistics discussed and each of them point to undeniable evidence that social media is here to stay and is exponentially growing.

We learned that the smart business person will use social media to engage their customer base through the use of text, pictures and video. More importantly, it should be used not as a vehicle for a campaign, but rather as a means to build relationships. It is easy to leave a company but hard to leave a friend.

Social Media builds friendships that will grow your business. The paradigm shift has happened and we at BizVid Communications intend to take full advantage of what it can offer.