Do your children know more than you about social marketing?

Are you lost when it comes to the world of Facebook and Twitter? Wondering why your kids are wasting their time posting on these services? In the old days, not too long ago, we would make phone calls to our friends when we wanted to set up a time and place to meet face-to-face, or just to exchange ideas. That was good enough back in the days when our network was local; just the people you could get to see in a short drive.

In the 10 years or so since the social media revolution took place, the world has gotten smaller and our individual worlds have gotten bigger and more populated. Our world now includes friends in remote places. If you are a traveler, and you have met new friends on a trip to Europe or Asia, and you want to keep in touch, now it is possible. Young people have naturally gravitated toward this ever-expanding network of former high school classmates scattered across colleges around the country, or new friends of those friends. Our circle has become an exponentially larger network.

How does this work for us in business? Business owners and marketers have always known that networking is an extremely powerful method of introducing their products and services to those who can serve as end users or referral sources. Direct advertising on social networks is only the first phase of the possibilities.

When linked with Internet search marketing, the other relatively young technical field, a powerful alliance is created. This article can’t go too deep into the technical aspects of social marketing and search optimization, but suffice it to say that as a combination, they can be an extremely effective alliance. Your network interacts with your marketing efforts and the sum is much greater than the parts. You may have developed an effective business network in business school, but it pales in comparison to the possibilities that social marketing offers. The goods and services sold through the new networks are not only more effective, but are becoming the only viable avenue as the effectiveness of paper marketing fades.

Speaking of the ineffectiveness of paper marketing, have you noticed that mobile phones have become the dominant type of communication device? A new smartphone is activated every two seconds. The reason is that it is no longer necessary to go to print media for information, products, services and of course using Facebook, Twitter and all the other hundreds of social and marketing sites that exist now.

Here’s to the children for paving the way.