We live in a day and age where the lines between our social life, our purchasing life and our work life are becoming more and more blurred because of the ever increasing hold that social media is taking a hold in our lives.
As a worker we are continually bombarded with what is happening in the world, in the lives of our friends and through all forms of online advertising and alerts. And as employers we are presented with the challenge – should we create an environment that is totally devoid of this interference, or should we encourage our staff to engage?
New research shows almost three quarters of Australian workers say ‘watching YouTube’ is the most common online activity at work. The survey from Dynamic Business Magazine also shows more than a third of Australians spend at least an hour on Facebook while at work.
‘Many of us are in front of a computer for the majority of our work day, often in our own cubicles or offices and now we know what’s really going on,’ said DBM’s Jen Bishop. ‘This kind of online activity is often generated by emails we receive promoting sales or new products, emails about new messages or posts on Facebook or friends emailing about new YouTube videos we just have to watch.’
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And we all thought that there couldn’t be anything bigger than Google. Oh how wrong we can be. See what has just happened in this amazing world called the Internet.
‘Facebook has overtaken Google to become the most popular website in the United States for the first time, according to new data from Hitwise, which measures Internet traffic. For the week ending March 13, the social networking juggernaut registered 7.07% market share, beating the search giant’s 7.03% market share.
“The market share of visits to Facebook.com increased 185% last week as compared to the same week in 2009, while visits to Google.com increased 9% during the same time frame,” Heather Dougherty, Director of Research at Hitwise wrote in a blog post. (Facebook briefly topped Google last Christmas and New Year’s, but this is the first time the website’s weekly numbers have beaten Google.)
The new data is sure to unnerve Google, which has been trying to crack into the social networking market — with controversial results. For Facebook, the data will add further fuel to its push to go public sometime in the next year or two, as CEO Mark Zuckerberg has suggested. Analysts predict that when Facebook does go public, it could see an immediate valuation of $35 billion — a figure which could rise to $100 billion by 2015.
Since December 26, Hitwise’s data shows Facebook steadily closing the gap on Google in terms of weekly U.S. visits.
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My Gen Y daughter just bought her first car at auction, saving thousands of dollars on the retail value of the vehicle, and just this past week got her license on her first attempt.
I would like to think that she is smarter than the rest, because she has her dad’s brains, but read on and find out what a whole lot of her generation are doing when it comes to buying cars.
“Computers are turning into the hot rods of the 21st century.” states Neil McDonald of The Courier Mail.
“Unlike their parents, Gen Y is bypassing car ownership and driving the cyber highway to stay in touch with friends. Few see cars as necessary and increasingly they are staying at home, using social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace to hook up with friends.
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The three social media that you can use to advance your career are the Blog, Facebook and Twitter.
So before I share with you 10 Social Media tips – allow me to introduce you briefly to each of these three media.
1. Blogs
A Blog is a website usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary and descriptions. You can either have a Blog created by a web designer as a separate entity, or as part of an existing website, or you can set up your own at www.blogger.com . With 40,000 blogs in Australia and 130 million in the world, they are providing a powerful place to share information in text format, photos and even video. One of the effective ways to drive traffic to your Blog is to find other blogs or forums that relate to the industry within which you wish to launch your career, and start commenting. Find your niche and communicate. If you would like to design a blog that complements your brand talk to the team at www.oe-design.com.
Facebook helps you to connect and share with the people in your life. With over 5 million users in Australia alone and growing, it can open up a large audience. The average user has 120 friends on their site. An interesting statistic is that more than half of Facebook users are outside college and the fastest growing demographic is those 35 years old and older. These could represent your future bosses.
Twitter can advance your career by allowing you to access the leaders in your industry. Through using search.twitter.com you can identify your specific niche and begin to engage influencers. Don’t forget to use www.tinyurl.com as part of your brief posting strategy and drive traffic back to your Blog.
So when you create your Blog, your Facebook account and your Twitter account – what next?
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We live in a day and age where the lines between our social life, our purchasing life and our work life are becoming more and more blurred because of the ever increasing hold that social media is taking a hold in our lives.