When it comes to comparing the effectiveness of various Marketing & Advertising mediums, it’s hard to compete with good old fashioned “Word of Mouth”.   In fact, in a recent Nielsen survey, only 14% of those polled indicated that they “trusted” any form of traditional “push” Marketing such as TV, Radio, etc., yet still to this day, over 74% of those responding said they “trusted” Word of Mouth.   Historically, the challenge with Word of Mouth has been its “reach” and its “speed to market”.  While it has always been highly effective in its results, it just couldn’t reach enough people fast enough in many cases, at least compared to other mediums.  Now, with the rapid rise of Social Media (i.e. Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, etc.) portals, do we have the best of both worlds possibly?  Is it possible that those one by one Word of Mouth conversations of days past, can now take place across an entire community of hundreds if not thousands of people at a time?  Can you imagine the impact this might have on your business!?  If it’s positive talk, your business could boom with the reach and speed to market of the Internet & Social Media portals.  Wow!  But hold on, now consider the not so attractive alternative, if its negative talk about your business, how quickly could that destroy your business!  Whew, scary.  Like it or not, Social Media is here to stay, and while it's still emerging relative to how all it might be used from a Marketing perspective, it’s critical that you form a Social Media Strategy now to both promote and protect your business.  Best of luck!

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