New to social networking? Here are the top 3 sites to help you get your feet wet!
1. Facebook.com
Launched back in 2004, Facebook has grown by leaps and bounds to the social networking site that it is today. As of May 2012 Facebook now has over 900 million active users that include your family, friends, old high school buddies, and college roommates. Facebook I has been a great go-to source for connecting with past friends and keeping up with out-of-state family members. This social networking site gives you the power to share pictures, update your status instantly, and do a live check-in to any location you are at.
2. Twitter.com
Looking for a place to briefly share your thoughts in 140 characters? Then Twitter would be your destination. Jack Dorsey launched the microblogging site back in 2006 and now 340 million tweets go out a day. You can stay up to date with your favorite celebrity or favorite blog’s latest posting instantly with Twitter.
With functions like group posting by topic or type by use of hashtags – words or phrases prefixed with a "#" sign. Feel free to also communicate with other Twitter accounts you follow with the "@" sign followed by a username that is used for mentioning or replying to other users. To repost a message from another Twitter user, and share it with one’s own followers, the retweet function is symbolized by “RT” in the message.
3. LinkedIn.com
Better known as social networking for professionals, LinkedIn has become your modern-day networking tool. No need to make your way to every convention, conference, or trade show to make new contacts anymore. LinkedIn brings all of this and more to your computer screen.
With its endless list of connections that you can make with peers in your industry LinkedIn allows you to professionally email over an introduction to someone you’ve been wanting to do business with for years. LinkedIn also offers a mass amount of “groups” you can get involved in with forum discussion to open up the conversation waves between you and your peers in that specific industry.
Bonus Tip:
Hootsuite.com – Now that you’ve joined all of these social networking sites, it’s time to start posting. It can become overwhelming with logging in to each site daily, but Hootsuite gives you the power to do it all at one time on their interface. You can link all of your accounts there and post to each all at once without leaving that one page. It makes social networking much easier!
