1)      Social media - The most affordable way to market since word of mouth.

2)      Social media allows your customers to hear from you through Inbound Marketing.

3)      Inbound marketing –unlike filtered e-mails, junk mail and paper,TV and radio ads–allows customers 2 hear from who they want 2 hear from:you!

4)      Economic times are tough. Wasted money on traditional marketing is out the door as social media and networking explodes!

5)      Twitter is being used by hundreds of thousands of businesses as we speak. Some of them may even be your competition.

6)      34 percent of active web users blog about their opinions on products and brands. What are they saying about your business?

7)      36 percent of web users think more positively about companies that have blogs. You have knowledge that can help others! Blog it!

8)      Google & other search engines like when you have outbound links to other sites. Link building helps get the word out and ur online presence!

9)      Social networking, in the long run, saves your business money on marketing and advertising.

10)   Other businesses that have had a head start on it are more prone to higher (unpaid) search engine rankings.

11)   Your online presence is as equally as, if not more, important for sales growth as your storefront.

12)   Twitter Audio is the same as a radio commercial – only free.

13)   Twitter allows people to search for the topics you write about.

14)   Social media sites, like digg and StumbleUpon, are like up-to-the-minute newspapers on your industry.

15)   YouTube can be used like TV commercials – only free.

16)   Flickr is like a color brochure for your business – only free.

Honestly, I could go on for a long time with this list. Outside of Facebook questions, I often get questions like “What is social media and how can it help my business?” Social media is a buzz word now. It encompasses many internet marketing strategies and is appealing to many businesses now because of its affordability.

Pledge to your employees, investors and customers that you plan to keep costs down in 2010 by committing to launch your social media campaign immediately. To do so, click here.