Choosing your Social Media

A list recently got published with the names of 250 social media networks categorized by type and detailed with their Alexa rank (a number given based on how many visits the website has, the lower the number the most visits the site has had). 250 social media networks. That's just the tip of the iceberg. There are so many social media platforms out there that no one can really call themselves a social media expert; there's no such thing. No one can know about and be active on every social media site out there, there aren't enough hours in the day. This list tells me two things; one, that for someone who isn't entirely comfortable with social media, thinking about joining can be completely overwhelming; and two, that organizations should be very careful when choosing which social media networks to join.

On this list, under "Networking" there are 15 different sites. Facebook has an Alexa ranking of 2, while another site, ECpod has a ranking of 1,634,342. For a network like Twitter (categorized as a microblog) they are they only one in their category with an Alexa ranking under 15,000. Twitter is ranked 14, the next most visited is ranked 16, 349.

So as an organization looking to join social media, you should be thinking very carefully about which platforms to use. Think about how much time you want to spend on social media daily; how many sites do you want to update and maintain? We typically only work with a handful of platforms because they are the most frequented sites and will get you the most bang for your buck. Some sites out there are meant for niche markets; auto clubs, pet services, gaming, fashion etc and if you are an organization that has a niche market they may be right for you. The standard Facebook and Twitter, however, should be your first move before jumping into a site with fewer members and where there will be less interaction with your organization.