Identifying Social Media

The first step for public relations professionals in understanding how to use social media to their benefit is identifying what exactly can be used as a social media platform.

There are dozens among hundreds of websites and programs on the Internet that can be classified as social media platforms, but not everything communication-related can be classified as social media. Social media heavyweights consists of, but not limited to, websites such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and MySpace. The middleweight social media platforms range from, but not limited to, websites such as LinkedIn to del.icio.us to Classmates.com. These are examples of social media platforms being a commonplace for anyone on the Internet to visit, develop their own identity, share it openly with others and connect and network with others.

A Facebook page can connect hundreds of people by common education networks or similar interest groups. A YouTube channel can connect people across the world with common interests. A Twitter account can disseminate news or updates to millions of “followers” in less then two seconds because connections were made based on like interests.

However, not everything on the Internet where communication takes places can be considered social media. For example, instant messaging (using programs such as AOL/AIM, Yahoo! Messenger or iChat) or e-mail group lists (where users sign-up for e-mail updates on a regular basis) are not examples of social media because even though the number of individual communications can increase, those platforms cannot grow beyond its means.

Social media can be found anyplace on the Internet where one platform is used to make connections or networks with others that has the potential for exponential growth. Once identified, public relations professionals can use social media platforms as a device to communicate not only with their intended or targeted audience (including consumers), but with journalists and maybe more importantly with a non-targeted audience that has been introduced by accidentally networking.