Before the contact databases, PDA's, and Rolodex™ there was the little black book. Loaded with all your powerful and often secret contacts, or the names and phone numbers of your girl friends. The little black book was a valuable resource. However it was static- nothing more than a container of information. Today software such as ACT™, Salesforce.com™, or Mircosoft™ CRM is still only containers of information.

Social networking is a dynamic alternative to the little black book. According to comScore Networks membership rates on Myspace is increasing at an average annual growth rate of 512% giving you the ability to connect with over 225 million users today. Rival Facebook is increasing at 550% per year followed by Linked-in at 182% per year.

Professional social networks provide an opportunity for an advertising vertical. Plaxo has the Plaxo Pulse, Linked-In has Network Updates. At a basic level the Pulse and Network Updates are status updates similar to a micro-blog tool such as Twitter. However the potential exists to use the available services to inform your connections about product discounts, blog posts, and other information related to your business.

At Root & Madison, we implement social networking into our small business marketing strategy and we are seeing fantastic results.

How are you using Social Networks to promote your business, product or service?

Please comment with your answers.