With 2011 drawing to a close and 2012 just around the corner, businesses may be a little worried about what the New Year holds for them. Indeed, many are predicting that 2012 will be a difficult year. Due to the ongoing economic crisis in Europe and ongoing worries about a double-dip recession, it should be obvious that these worries are well-founded. However, with a little preparation and understanding of successful business and marketing strategies, you will weather 2012 like a champ, and you may even flourish a little.

So what can I do?

The first thing to remember is to not, under any circumstances, freak out about these predictions. This may lead to a decrease in spending and fewer new hires, which will play right into these naysayers’ diabolical plans. Indeed, a recently released report by a group of University of Massachusetts economists suggests the current unemployment crisis could be solved if America’s largest banks and non-financial companies would cough up some of the $3.6 trillion in cash that they have been hoarding over the last few years.

“There is no reason that the US needs to remain stuck in a long-term unemployment crisis, Robert Pollin, lead author of the report and co-director of the Political Economy Research Institute, said in a statement. “Getting the banks and corporations to move their hoards into productive investments and job creation requires carrots and sticks—policies such as a new round of government spending stimulus as well as taxes on the banks’ excess reserves—that can both strengthen overall market demand and unlock credit markets for small businesses.”

Okay, what next?

After you are able to breathe a sigh of relief and stop worrying about things over which you have no control, it’s time to focus on the things that you do have control over, in order to strengthen your company and ensure that your year is productive and profitable.

Like it or not, the Internet is here to stay. The stats from this past Cyber Monday only serve to prove that this medium is not only highly effective for marketing, but that it can literally make the difference between a successful year and one that is not-so-successful. Learn to use every aspect of the Internet, in order to gain a toehold in the virtual marketplace.

And how exactly do I go about doing that?

Here are five places on the Internet where you should focus your attention in order to have a stellar 2012.

1. Social media sites, which were originally dismissed as being a frivolous waste of time, have really helped small businesses. Not only do they offer consumers a way of spreading the word about your business in a new-fangled word-of-mouth manner, but some sites like Facebook now offer advertising. If you were going to plan a weekend trip to the Windy City and were looking at Chicago hotels and events for your itinerary, would you choose one that you had never heard of, or go with the one that your Great Aunt Rhoda raved about on her Twitter account? You get my point.
2. Blogs are important, whether they are your own or someone else’s. By starting your own blog, you give consumers an insight into your business, and also open the floor for discussion and/or constructive criticism about what’s working and what’s not. By reading others’ blogs—particularly “mommy blogs” and those sites geared toward consumers—you are able to hear what consumers are saying, in their own words, and can strategize accordingly.
3. Google is more than just a way to pass the time or find directions to the theatre. By using white hat SEO tactics, you can increase your site’s visibility and brand recognition; this is done by raising you in the search results, which equates to more revenue for your company. The key is to learn everything there is to know about white-hat SEO and Google’s various algorithmic updates, in order to avoid angering the Google gods (hint: think relevant, quality content over spammy junk).
4. As I previously mentioned, Google and Facebook now offer advertising that is affordable and far more efficient than traditional advertising methods. In addition, email marketing is the new way of targeting consumers that doesn’t involve wasted paper, expensive postage, and annoyed consumers. Each of these methods is better able to target the specific demographic that you desire than previous methods.

Learn everything you can about web design and HTML code. This way, you can create an aesthetically-pleasing, intuitive site that will lure customers in and keep them there. There are multiple guides on the Internet for doing this, or you can hire a professional. Whatever your choice, be sure that your site is always at its best.

A freelance illustrator Beatriz Torres, best known as Zirta has drawn the ongoing competition between Google+ and FaceBook in a funny way.

I think the most ironic part of the illustration is MySpace Founder Tom Anderson’s advice for Mark Zuckerberg to sell FaceBook before it’s too late. Tom Anderson actually  shared this comic and his thoughts about  the question of “when to sell” on his Google+ account :)

Social Media has completely changed how we as a culture communicate and interact with one another.  Myspace, Facebook, and YouTube allowed anyone to create a website that is all about themselves and their ideas.   These social media outlets allow us to express our selves in a completely different way than what we ever could before.  But, there is a darker side to social media and companies tracking our behaviors.  Like all forms of technology, social media is constantly changing and coming up with new ways for people to express them selves.

• Interactive broad casts: Ustream is the new YouTube, by allowing people to stream live video of events online.  Even politicians are using Ustream to allow a larger population of voters to speak out and ask questions.  This allowed the political candidates to answer the questions in a timely manner.  More and more people are watching internet broadcasting and this trend is not going away anytime soon.
• Review Sites:  Sites such as angie’s list are taking on a strong presence in the social media landscape.  Consumers not only want to know about products before they buy, they also want their opinions, on the product, to be heard after the purchase.  These websites are forcing companies to respond to both the positive and negative reviews.  All it takes is for one person to write a negative review to spark others who have had similar experiences to jump on the band wagon.  Review sites such as Angie’s List definitely make it a buyers’ market; which is beneficial to those looking.
• Location check in:  So you go to your favorite lunch spot on Wednesday and you want all of your friends to know about it.  Instead of just updating your status on Facebook you can now utilize Facebook places or foursquare.  This allows you to check in to places you go throughout the day on your smart phone.  The apps award points and sometimes the stores you check into award you coupons or discounts on your next purchase.  This is great advertising for the companies because when people check into a location it prompts their friends to come to that location too.  It also allows users to interact with their environment by using their mobile devices.

With all of these new and growing social media trends it crazy to think about all of the information about us is known by companies.  But by someone taking part in these different medias they are giving companies permission to use the information.  Use these services for their advantages, but be aware of all the stipulations.

This guest post was contributed by Joseph Baker.

Joseph Baker’s business experience in management spans more than 15 years. A leader of development and management teams, he also implemented budget reductions professionally and as an independent contractor. Joseph led strategic planning and systems of implementation for nine organizations, public and private, and worked extensively with small businesses.

He holds a Bachelor of Science in Marketing from Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business, and an MBA from Kellogg School of Management.

Refers to the late 1990s during which countless Internet companies were riding an enormous wave of enthusiasm that pushed their stock valuations into the stratosphere even though they never made a penny. Billions in venture capital were given to entrepreneurs with little or no experience to fund ideas that were ludicrous. It was a crazy time, and people were very excited. With all of the nonsense, many dot-coms did survive, and countless concepts and techniques were developed that continue today.

In these days, professionals from tech and media industries repeat all together that social media companies are over-valuıed and we are “in the middle of a social media bubble”. Some experts think that these social networking sites will never figure out a workable business model because there may not be one.

Mashable shared this Infographic prepared by social media site G+ about top-valuations of  social media sites.

People have many alternatives to sign in around the web. Users have existing online IDs and they don’t want any more accounts to sign-in. Internet developers need to determine which providers to let their users how to login.

The Infographic below from Gigya shows what online people are using the most to sign in around the web. Here are some statistics from the research.

• Across All Sites: 46% of people prefer FaceBook, 17% Google and 14% Twitter…
• Entertainment Sites: 52% percent prefer FaceBook to sign-in entertainment sites, 15% Twitter and 14% MySpace…
• News Sites: Twitter is preferred 45% to sign-in News Sites, 25% FaceBook and 16% Google…
• B2B Sites: 37% FaceBook, 19%Google and 18% Yahoo…

These statistics show us FaceBook is above all other alternatives to sign in online. I think this Infographic will be very helpful for developers to decide which online IDs are most important for their websites.
Which online ID do you use the most?

What can happen in one day? If you are talking social media, the answer is a lot. DBA Worldwide has made a cool video for the impressive stats of social media. For example 700,000 new users register on FaceBook every day…

A Day in the Life of Social Media from DBA Worldwide on Vimeo.

The Internet Internet traffic is increasing very rapidly, close to doubling each year since 1997.    Jesse Thomas collected remarkable stats on the Internet in one video. As the social network sites and YouTube like media-sharing sites take much more time in our lives, People-Powered Internet grows up. Some of the amazing figures about people-powered  Internet shared in the video:

• - Facebook gets more than 260 billios pageviews per month.
• - YouTube serves 1 billion videos in one day.
• - The average Internet user in the USA watches 182 online videos in a month.
• - There are 1.4 billions email users worldwide.

Thanks Jesse Thomas for combining and animating these stats. You can watch the video below:

JESS3 / The State of The Internet from Jesse Thomas on Vimeo.

In a funny, rapid-fire 4 minutes, Reddit Founder & Entrepreneur Alexis Ohanian tells the real-life fable of one humpback whale’s rise to Web stardom at TedIndia 2009 Event. The lesson of Mister Splashy Pants is a shoo-in classic for meme-makers and marketers in the Facebook age. A great story to show how social media can effect a change in the real World. If you want to watch the video, go ahead.

Alexis Ohanian co-founded Reddit, a social-voting news website with geek allegiances, a small-town feel and a penchant for lighting up the memes your friends IM you about next week. Reddit was founded by Steve Huffman and Alexis Ohanian in 2005, both 22-year-old graduates of the University of Virginia. It received its initial funding from Y Combinator. Condé Nast Publications, owner of Wired, acquired Reddit on October 31, 2006. Ohanian left Reddit in his official capacity in 2009, but continues to be involved with the site’s direction as a sort of godfather, dispensing friendly wisdom (and t-shirts) from his user account, kn0thing. Of late, he’s focusing on Breadpig, a hub for geeky books and merchandise.

Did you know, monkeys have 12 hairs at any one time

Artist and computer scientist Jonathan Harris makes online art that captures the world’s expression — and gives us a glimpse of the soul of the Internet. Jonathan Harris wants to make sense of the emotional world of the Web. With deep compassion for the human condition, his projects troll the Internet to find out what we’re all feeling and looking for. In this Ted Video, Jonathan Harris tells The Web’s Secret stories.

While news from Iran streams to the world, Clay Shirky shows how Facebook, Twitter and TXTs help citizens in repressive regimes to report on real news, bypassing censors (however briefly). The end of top-down control of news is changing the nature of politics. Shirky, a prescient voice on the Internet’s effects, argues that emerging technologies enabling loose collaboration will change the way our society works.

In this Ted Talk which took place at took place at the U.S. Department of State, Clay Shirky tells the effects of Social Media on our livings.

Celebrated yearly on 5 June, World Environment Day (WED) is one of the principal vehicles through which the United Nations stimulates worldwide awareness of the environment and enhances political attention and action. WED was firstly established by the UN General Assembly in 1972 to mark the opening of the Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment.The theme for 2009 is climate change and the broader consequences of environmental change, and what societies can do in response.

Combating climate change and preserving ecosystems services that underpin our economies is an issue for everyone. Every individual’s efforts, no matter how small, can contribute to the sustainable development of our economies and communities around the world.

On this day, individuals, non-governmental organizations, community and youth groups, business, industry and the media organize activities to renew their commitments to protect and develop the environment. They organize activities such as clean-up campaigns, tree planting, colourful street rallies, green concerts, essay and photo competitions in schools, and recycling efforts.

Internet has an important effect for the announcement of these types of activities. Especially; as social networking platforms get more popular, we see different examples of “How Social Networking Can Change The World” . Individuals, communities and organizations use social networking as a fast and reliable tool to reach targeted people. The community-driven web can really make a difference.

There are easy ways of using social media to try to change the world for a good cause. One of them is publishing a  blog post on a universal topic, as i do. One another way is tweeting with a purpose. An example for tweeting with a purpose is United Nations Environment Programme’s (UNEP) “Twitter for trees” campaign. UNEP has a platform called “UNEP and You” – an on-going social networking platform for environmental activism. UNEP has pledged to plant 100,000 trees for 100,000 followers– or one for every follower if we can achieve more than 100,000– by World Environment Day, 5 June. This effort supports the UNEP – Billion Tree Campaign’s goal to plant a total of seven billion trees- 1 for every person on the planet- by year’s end.Add your voice and tweet loudly www.twitter.com/UNEPandYou to help the environment!

We’ve seen how social media is good for business. It helps build a brand, drives traffic and awareness and builds out communities.But, what we’ve also seen is social media bringing together people to lend their time to important causes on a global level. By using the sites we live on every day-why not use all of these friends and followers to do something good? With the help from online communities this process can become even easier, and the results can be nearly instantaneous.

After the dot-com (Web 1.0) bust, financing a web site wasn’t easy. But when we met Web 2.0, the Internet usage started to grow rapidly and investors started to become interested in investing web projects, again. Theorically, a business model with a monetizing income model is a must of a project for being invested in. But some web projects have no business model but something more important than a business model: Popularity.

Twitter is one of the most popular – top 500 – websites in the world, has a Google PageRank of 9 and no income model! Twitter is a privately funded startup with offices in the SoMA neighborhood of San Francisco, CA. Started as a side project in March of 2006, Twitter has grown into a real-time short messaging – microblogging service that works over multiple networks and devices. In the world of microblogging, people use the web or their cell phones to blast short updates on their activities to their virtual followers. An update is limited by 140 characters.

Twitter has drawn much attention in the tech world and has been funded two times, Series A: $5M, Series B: $15M and one of the investors in Series B was Bezos Expeditions – the company that manages Jeff Bezos’ personal venture capital investments. What a Paradox! A company with no income model but $20M fund. As Twitter becomes more popular, more gossips about Twitter’s expected income model, come out.

The last gossip was the most discussed one: “Companies using Twitter for commercial purposes may soon start getting charged for that activity, according to an interview British trade magazine Marketing (part of BrandRepublic) held with co-founder Biz Stone.” As you see the news headlines in the image at the left, this news has drawn very much attention in the tech-media. But a reply from Twitter came immediately. Twitter’s co-founder Biz Stone has written a blog post  related to the rumors with the title “Nothing To Report Just Yet“. He announced that Twitter will remain free to to use by everyone-individuals, companies, celebrities, etc. He’s telling that they’re thinking about offering new value added services to earn money and not imposing fees on existing services.

I think, a business plan is a must to start an internet business but sometimes a unique – niche idea eith no income model is worth investing and Jeff Bezos must have seen the future of Twitter.

Power.com is a new and 100% free platform that integrates social sites and provides a single interface to communicate, to browse, add a status message to all and reach content over these sites. Power.com is compatible with the following social sites: Orkut, MySpace, Hi5, Facebook, YouTube, Flogão and VoteMe. Power.com is founded in Brasil and Orkut, Google’s Social Network which is very popular in Brasil; so 5 million users have signed up Power.com since August and most of them is from Brasil and use their Orkut account.

On the Internet, there are many Web 2.0 services which we use on the Internet with the same purposes and it’s getting harder to control all of them at the same time. Web 3.0 will be about integrating similar Web 2.0 services and Power.com is a good piece. I think, Power.com is one of the first Web 2.5 services on the way of Web 3.0 and adding Facebook Connect and OpenID support can make Power.com more powerful.

Health 2.0: Expansive definition “New concept of health care wherein all the constituents (patients, physicians, providers, and payers) focus on health care value (outcomes/price) and use competition at the medical condition level over the full cycle of care as the catalyst for improving the safety, efficiency, and quality of health care” – Last updated on May 25, 2007 (Source: Scott Shreeve, MD – January 24, 2007) .

Health 2.0 is a platform ( techonologies ) including weblogs,social bookmarking, wikis, podcasts, social networks and APIs about healtcare. Approximately 59 percent of health searchers used the Internet to (Source:”How America Searches – Health Wellness, January 2008, iCrossing) get information and women ( % 63 ) are more inclined.  Health searchers are mostly  18-34 year-old ( %65) and college graduated ( %62). Younger and more educated searchers are interested in these popular topics; symptoms, treatment, diseases/conditions, wellness, drugs,vitamins… Which web 2.0 tools are mostly used  to reach information about health? The answers are listed by high percentages are search engines( %67), social media, wikipedia, social network, podcasts and blogs.

Health searchers differently tend social networks to discuss treatment or medication, to get moral, to have  opinions about doctors and hospitals or to get appointment.

PatientsLikeMe, founded in 2004 by three MIT engineers, has lots of subcommunities about neurological, mood and immune conditions. You can reach treatment, symptoms and research information all about these conditions which context is developing by patients.

The other network is HealthWorldWeb founded in 2006. Differently of PatientsLikeMe, you get knowledge from doctors or search the doctor by specialty.  Also you can visit same networks for physicians and nurses

I think when the population gets older in ten years, the health services or communities which offer physicians,nurses or doctors  for home nursing or which analyse the data of self- tests ( pefmeter test for asthma, blood test for diabetic ) will be popular. We can imagine the services analyze the symptoms while driving or looking to mirror everyday. What do you think the trends will be for health services?

LinkedIn announces the launch of its applications platform called InApps. LinkedIn apps must be approved before going public to prevent junk apps which plague social networking sites.

Presently, there are 9 applications that you see live on LinkedIn from Amazon, Google, WordPress, Huddle, Six Apart, Box.net, SlideShare, Tripit and LinkedIn itself. These applications can only use LinkedIn’s own Ad network but they can implement a paid subscription service.

This platform will let more than 30 million users of LinkedIn to communicate and share better than before and enhance their productivity. You can read the full story and watch videos about the application platform in this official LinkedIn Blog post.

In this post, we’ll take a look at LinkedIn’ s excellent growth but firstly let’s talk a few about ‘Business Social Networking’ .

Day to day, social networking becomes more important for us. Organizations that want to manage partnerships with their customers, suppliers and other organizations in the same industries start attending ‘Business Social Networks’. These organizations gain more efficient methods of communication, feedback and insight opportunity from their partners.

Succesful businesses recognize the importance of increasing loyalty through active communities for their partners. Smart companies use Web 2.0 technologies to reach their ‘business partners ecosystem’ with a cheaper, faster, more measurable and more efficient way. They use their business social networks as an easy and a powerful tool to reach and listen to their partners.

The value of a business social network is limited by the ability of creating conversations, sharing experiences, answering questions and offering feedback from partners. Briefly, the business professionals have started to see the value of being trasparent to their partners and understand to use social networks as viral marketing tools – called ‘social network marketing’ . ‘Monetizing the value of social networks’ will be a topic of a future post.

LinkedIn is the biggest business social networking site that gives members the ability of creating business contacts, finding potential customers, hiring/seeking jobs. LinkedIn has 30+ million users representing 150+ industries around the world. LinkedIn founded in 2003 and has caught a sustainable growth in years. In 2007, LinkedIn grew more than 300%.  LinkedIn’ s creative platform has changed traditional business card exchange process into spending time on LinkedIn and watching number of connections grow.

Today, LinkedIn CEO Dan NYE is announcing on company blog that LinkedIn has received $22.7 million investments from market leaders in their sectors. SAP Ventures, Goldman Sachs and The McGraw-Hill join the LinkedIn team after this investment. LinkedIn’s D Round of Funding closed at $1 billion valuation. In this volatile economic enviroment, it’s a very precious success to get these important companies as strategic partners. We congratulate LinkedIn …