Twitter logoWell don’t be fooled to think that Twitter is all about celebrities antics and what people like us had for lunch!

Stats realeased back in July of this year, indicated that Twitter users are now sending 200 million tweets a day which compares to only 2 million being sent in early 2009. A fairly meterioric rise by anyone standards. In the summer of 2010, it was only 65 million tweets a day. Wow that is some growth in activity levels!

Facebook still dwarfs Twitter in terms of number of users (estimated at around 700+ million – phew!) but there is no doubt that Twitter is here to stay and is growing in take-up and daily usage levels.

It’s been stated that Facebook users share over 30 billion items of content, that’s web links, videos, photos or blog posts, every month. The stats are truly amazing.

But as ever in your marketing as a small business, you need to look at what platform or mix of social media platforms will be right to reach your target audience.

Don’t get on the Twitter bandwagon because you feel you have to. I had that exact conversation with a new coaching client only last week. She felt she had to be on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, blogging – the whole shabang(!) just because all of her competitors are doing it.

My top social media marketing tip is don’t be fooled by the hype, just because your competition are on there doesn’t mean it is actually working for them! You need a proper social media strategy and action plan, otherwise you will go at it with a scattergun approach and then you will end up, feeling frustrated by the time it is taking up and the lack of results you are getting.