Like dandelions in the spring, social media tools seem to be showing up everywhere. Facebook, Twitter, Plaxo, and LinkedIn are just a few of the players in a market that is growing at warp speed. In this article, we will examine some of the social media tools available to accountants and review how you can get started with social media.

What Is Social Media And What Social Media Tools Are Available?

Social media is just another way of communicating with others. Just as email burst onto the scene in the late 1990s as a generally accepted form of business communication, social media is another form of staying in touch with friends, colleagues, customers, clients, vendors, and other stakeholders. In addition to its primary purpose of networking, business applications involving social media are growing exponentially. Today, many businesses use social media for purposes such as recruiting, training, advertising and marketing, and research.

Though the number of social media tools changes daily, the major players in today’s market include:

• Facebook, a social networking website originally used primarily for personal communications.   
• Twitter, a free service allowing users to broadcast messages of up to 140 characters.    
• Plaxo, an online address book that provides for automatic updating of information and synchronization of contact data into.
• LinkedIn, an online networking service primarily targeted to business users. 

Of course, countless other forms of social media tools exist, including blogs, wikis, and even YouTube.

Are These Legitimate Business Tools For Accountants?

Are social networking tools legitimate business tools for accountants and other professionals? Let us answer this question by looking at the volume and momentum of some of the social media tools in use today:

• Facebook currently reports over 200 million active users, over half of whom log on to the site at least daily.
  The fastest growing demographic in Facebook is those 35 years old and older.
• Plaxo currently has over 20 million users.
• LinkedIn had over 12 million unique visitors and 48 million visits in the month of April.
• Usage of Twitter is increasing rapidly, with over 19 million unique visitors and 125 million visits in the month of April.
• All of the Big Four CPA firms have a presence on Facebook.
• The AICPA along with a large – and rapidly growing – number of state CPA societies have presences on both Facebook and Twitter.
• Intuit, Thomson Reuters, and Sage Software all have a presence on Facebook and many of their team members use Facebook, Twitter, Plaxo, and LinkedIn to communicate.

Based on both the volume and the breadth of usage, there is little doubt that social networking tools are legitimate tools for accountants and other business professionals.

How Do You Get Started?

Getting started with social media tools is easy and inexpensive. Most of the sites and services are free and you need only to visit the website of the tool you wish to use, sign up for an account, and begin accessing the benefits of social media immediately. Of course, carefully consider issues such as privacy, records and document retention, and whether your company or firm will allow personal use of social media tools - in addition to business use - during working hours before you implement social media tools throughout your organization.

Summary

More than just a way for your children and grandchildren to communicate with their friends, social media tools are rapidly integrating into the mainstream business world, including the accounting profession. Proactively consider how you and your organization will deal with social media tools. Just as email revolutionized business communications in the last decade – and faxes in the decade before – social media tools are changing the business landscape, even as you read this article.  Don’t get left behind!