Just what is social media marketing and is it any good?

In the "old days," folks spread their value proposition on radio and TV ads, Yellow Pages ads, as well as word of mouth (it still works) and other "hardcopy" media (newspapers, billboards, park benches, and shopping carts, to name a few).

While these methods still have value, there is no denying the fact that social media rules the day. Every major company that is either in a growth phase or wants to be in one is experimenting with marketing their wares through so-called social media outlets and channels like Twitter and Facebook.

They're also trying out Google Adwords, Bing, and Yahoo.

There are many effective ways to market your business, whether your small, medium, or large in size or whether you sell goods or services. In fact, ALL kinds of companies can profit from using social media sites to get their brand message and mission out, directly or indirectly sell their goods and services, or interact with prospects and customers.

You may remember a while back that Jack Black had an unpleasant experience on Southwest Airlines. The two parties had an entire dialog through twitter. It was an amazing exchange and brought to light the power of immediate contact with the companies with which we choose to do business or with our customers.

I suggest getting your feet wet by opening a twitter account. Choose a username that represents your company name or image. For example (and I have no idea whether this name is taken), if your company's name is XYZ Corp, try getting a twitter name of XYZ_Corp or XYZCorp (they don't allow many special characters, including hyphens and the name length is restricted too).

Whenever you make a post to your blog (you have a blog, right? If you don't, head on over to the Contact page and submit your information), tweet out that blog post URL to your twitter followers.

You see, nowadays, people have many more choices from which to view and gather information. Just 20 years ago, the entire landscape was different: Television, radio, and newspapers reigned supreme. In fact, they were really the ONLY choices.

Fast forward to today, and what you've got is not only television, but hundreds of channels, radio, satellite, newspapers, web which includes twitter, Facebook, individual company websites, cell phones–the list goes on and on!

Some people get all of their news and information from the web. If you're targeting a particular demographic and you neglect to advertise or market through a social media powerhouse like twitter, you may miss a sizable chunk of your target.

Social media marketing is not a passing fad. The 'net is here to stay. People choose it for much of their daily intake of information. You are wise for reading this–and even wiser if you begin implementing some social media marketing concepts.