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An Introduction to Social Media -- Where the Teens Are

Social media sites have caught fire with teens. Social media are the online tools and platforms such as MySpace (www.myspace.com) and Facebook (www.facebook.com) where users can share opinions, insights, experiences, and perspectives with each other. For marketers, social media sites are where they must turn to get the attention of these audiences. A recent Pew Internet and American Life study showed that 55% of online teens have created a personal profile online and have used networking sites like MySpace and Facebook. Not only do they create a profile, but they visit the sites daily or even more often. They use the sites to keep in touch with their friends and make their plans. If you want to be part of their plans, you, too, should have a strategy for marketing in social media.

Social media can take many different forms, including text, images, audio, and video. Teens are creating and sharing online content at a startling rate. What is truly astonishing is the creative effort plowed into its more popular forms: blogs, podcasts, and vlogs (video blogs). Every 24 hours, visitors to the popular video search engine YouTube (www.youtube.com) upload over 65,000 new videos, and users view 100 million video clips per day according to a July 2006 survey.

Today, almost anyone can become a content producer, content sharer or content commentator with a ready audience of their friends and their friends' friends. It is easy to understand the rapid spread of information across this heavily interconnected actively sharing universe. What does this mean for marketing professionals? Simply stated, it's where your audience hangs out if you are trying to reach savvy, relationship-rich young people. Check out the social media space and know where you're headed so you can realize its potential.

Note: Amanda Watlington will be writing on how to market in the social media space in a week or two, so stay tuned.

Amanda Watlington is a frequent speaker at Search Engine Strategies, AdTech, and other conferences. She is the principal of Searching for Profit, Charleston, Massachusetts.