Online social networks allow individuals to connect with others who share similar interests and backgrounds. They create online profiles that display personal information and form connections with other members. While social networks vary in their specific focus, they commonly enable users to explicitly or implicitly connect with others in the network based on shared experiences or actions. Organizations should engage with social networks because customers have lost trust in traditional marketing approaches, and social connections can help businesses rebuild trust through relationships and communities.

1. Digital Sociology Powered by: Ali Hadi

2. What is social networking?

3. In both professional and personal life, human beings naturally form groups based on affinities and expertise.

4. We gravitate to others with whom we share interests. Most of us belong to real world networks that formed organically. Not surprisingly, these networks rapidly migrated to the online world.

5. Online social networking has been around in various forms for nearly a decade, and has begun to achieve wide notice in the past few years.

6. Online social networks take many forms, and are created for many reasons. Despite their differences, online social networks do, however, commonly exhibit a number of the following concepts.

7. PROFILE Each member in a network has an online profile that serves as the individual’s identity in the network.

8. In the professional context, profiles often contain information regarding the individual’s experience, education, interests and affiliations, as well information about the individual’s skills and resources.

9. Online social networks typically enable individuals to make connections with others in the network. Connection

10. In some cases, these connections are implicit, And derived from past actions (such as sending an email to another member of the network).

11. In other cases, the connections are explicit, and are set up and created by the members themselves.

12. Deceptively simple, online social networks contain great power.

13. They change the online space from one of static web pages and stale marketing messages to a live, vibrant network of connected individuals who share their abilities, expertise and interests.

14. Why should our organization care about social networking?

15. Customers have lost trust in traditional sales, marketing and service (the three areas commonly referred to as “CRM,” or Customer Relationship Management).

16. The connections enabled by social networks are the glue that put the humanity back into business to solve the trust problem. In other words, the organizations that will win are the ones that most easily enable individuals to build relationships and communities with people they trust.

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