Guest Blogger - Lindsey Shirley

Facebook has swept through and changed the social networking world like a wave washing over the seashore. It has washed up on everyone from the bored student in class trying to talk to friends, to the overactive status positing adult trying to reconnect with high school friends, to the grandmother in Massachusetts trying to keep in contact with her grandkids down south. Attention to all current facebook users: a new kind of wave has just swept up on shore. Facebook is now going beyond the social networkers and is spreading to new group of people: businesses and non-profit causes. Facebook is now being called a “highly effective business tool” and it is even being said that asking for followers on Facebook is taking the place of running commercials on television. The features that attracted millions of people to the fun aspect of facebook are now being used to attract customers to an organization’s page and spread important information. The accessibility of Facebook to the everyday person is the strongest aspect of being able to use Facebook as a new floor for marketing and connecting with customers.

Facebook should be given more respect than being called to old time-waster and an outlet for nosey busybodies. Facebook can be utilized in a more productive, business like matter. Facebook is now being welcomed into the business world as a more influential, people-reaching, attention-getting site

Facebook is creating a positive influence on adults and teens as they are trying to attract the innumerable customers and advocates that are said to be crawling on the Facebook network daily. The new use of Facebook is encouraging people to speak out as open supporters of their favorite charity or promoters of their own business because they feel that through a wildly popular site such as Facebook, they are reaching more people. Businesses and organizations are required to have a topnotch page that makes you want to click on their name and see what they are up to. As a result of the new business Facebook trend washing through, most of us are newbies to becoming an online humanitarian, entrepreneur or club leader; we are reassured by the fact that we are spreading our message and cause to literally hundreds of people on a daily basis!

Essentially, Facebook is a way to expand an organization’s or our own personal digital footprint. The ability to use Facebook outside the social realm should be welcomed with open arms into the business and marketing society. What could be a better way to reach someone than to use a site on which almost everyone you know has a page?