CashMachineHackHoax: Social Media Is Making Its Mark: AllBusiness Weekly, 5/26/11

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May 26, 2011

Social Media Is Making Its Mark

The social networking feeding frenzy shows no signs of stopping. Better make sure your business is on the bandwagon -- and not just standing in the way.

You already know about the IPO over at LinkedIn, where the hired help is now busy shopping for Learjets and private islands. Twitter just dipped into petty cash to pay $40 million for TweetDeck. Our next-door neighbors at Zynga are apparently planning their own IPO, and you'd better believe that Facebook is paying close attention.

Maybe there's a bubble waiting to pop here. Maybe not. Unless you're an investor, who cares? When the dot-com bubble burst, the underlying business model was still sound, and it still changed how the world did business.

The social networking industry is driving a whole series of equally profound business changes. It's not that you're throwing out the book on customer service, sales, and marketing. It's just that the book has a bunch of new chapters -- and maybe a very different ending.

How far have things gone? Over at Morgan Stanley, the world's largest brokerage, financial advisors are getting the OK to "market themselves and share ideas with clients" via LinkedIn and Twitter.

There you have it: One of the most conservative players, in one of the nation's most heavily regulated industries, embracing social networking. According to one Morgan Stanley executive, the firm thinks the move will give them a "significant competitive advantage."

So much for making money the old-fashioned way.

Matthew McKenzie
Senior Editor

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