Another big lesson from the General Election

On Tuesday this week I spoke at a Marketing Masterclass in Newbury about 'How Business Networking Really Works'. Two of the other speakers, Nigel Morgan and Karen Chapple presented about the growing importance of Social Media. Karen shared the news that Google now has a Social Tab on its default search page in the US.

We had a big lesson in the UK yesterday on the power of Social Media. I wrote yesterday in 'Another Lesson from the General Election' about the off camera remarks from Gordon Brown that were picked up on microphone.

The speed at which this spread across the world should leave you in no doubt about the power of Social Media. It was a little ironic that Andy Lopata wrote about 'Whatever happened to the Social Media Election' yesterday morning where he included this rather prescient comment:

"Don't underestimate the power of a politician's gaffe during the closing days of the election to have a much bigger impact than ever before. Thanks to social media any slip up can be both shared globally and repeated ad nauseam irrespective of how many people witness it in person. The news media pick the stories up and run with them as people share them on Twitter, Facebook and Youtube."

If you are still wondering about whether Social Media is right for you and your business you should heed what Nigel and Karen said on Tuesday "If you do not have a Social Media presence you need to do something about that right now..."

Good Networking!
Dave Clarke