There are companies not engaging in social media. There are consumers not engaging in social media. There are marketing public relations practitioners not engaging in social media. But that window is closing fast. For those who believe social media and networking are not our future, just look around you.

According to Website Magazine in its Feb. 2010 issue, it says your “social graph” is the most important asset in business. A social graph is a collection of online connections.

In the magazine’s article, 50 Top Social Media Resources, they provided some data (from February):

• Facebook is the most popular social networking site for business owners.
• Of B2C organizations, 83 percent have Facebook profiles.
• Only 45 percent of B2C organizations have a Twitter account
• B2B companies have profiles on both sites in more or less equal proportion — 77 percent on Facebook and 73 percent on Twitter.
• Participants using social media day-to-day visit company or brand profiles on social sites 62 percent of the time and 55 percent of them search for business information on the social sites.

Before many a consumer makes a buy decision, they comb the search engines for buyer reviews, perhaps on Yelp or Complaints.com, and make an informed decision whether or not to make a purchase.  In addition, consumers seek a company’s Facebook profile to see how they engage, what news is available, how fans are responding, and how the company is replying. Perhaps there is a select group of people using these tools to inform a buy decision; and, this will be common practice as the months go by.

Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn are for sure the most well known and used by a plethora of people world-wide; however, they’re not the only players. Ever heard of Revver.com, diigo.com, blackplanet.com, hi5.com, or yuku.com? (Me, neither!) I don’t believe any company is solidly engaging with a majority of the top 50 social media resources listed by Website magazine. 

I’m going to make it my mission to share in my sleuthing. What’s your mission in the six months remaining in 2010? (Tick-tock…time’s up!

 ENGAGE!