Social media is a hot topic in every aspect of our business.  So much so, in fact, that one of our carriers is sponsoring a four week series of presentations from a social media expert for all of us at Cavalier Associates.  While there was some good information about how traditional companies are starting to execute in this arena, I was struck by a couple facts that were a part of the first ten minutes or so of the first presentation:

• Facebook's membership is twice the population of the United States
• Gender distribution is even in most social media settings
• 45% of members across most social media sites are between the ages of 25 and 44
• They are highly educated - with most members having attained some level of college or higher.  This is perhaps artificially low given the high number of current college students - they have not completed their education.
• Outside of LinkedIn, the dominant site for professional networking, the average income of the members is less than $75,000 per year. 

Great, so what do we do with these facts?  Let's be honest, based on these statistics, none of us are going to strike it rich by executing really fantastic social media strategies.  The demographics just aren't there.  At best there may be some transactional sales to be had.  If we believe that, then why bother paying any attention to social media at all?  Future growth.  Look back at the list above.  This is a young, highly educated group.  They also stand to inherit one tremendous amount of wealth and most have their peak earning years ahead of them.  Developing a strategy to build brand recognition using their preferred method of communication - social media - is probably a solid long term strategy.  Implement it in phases over time, rather than rushing headlong into what will almost certainly not be a revenue generating activity for some time to come.

One of the fundamental tenets of doing this effectively is to recognize just what draws people to social media - other people! - rather than a company.  We should understand this in our business better than most, as financial services has always been based on relationships, with business conducted face to face. This brings me to my last point for today: I have finally encountered the highest and best use of the Ipad for business.  I was in on a client appointment with multiple participants this week.  The producer I was with had an Ipad for every attendee, and a presentation that was synced to his Ipad.  As he moved the presentation along, each attendee's Ipad kept in perfect sync.  No fooling with projectors, no stacks of handouts, and no noise from everyone flipping ahead impatiently.

The icing on the Ipad cake is that they have already recovered the costs in savings on printing presentations!

Go get yourself an Ipad, and start tweeting!