“What do you do?”  It’s a question people ask of one another every day.  I love talking about what I do.  When I tell people that I’m a marketing consultant they always nod their heads as if it is the coolest thing ever, but if I ever mention that I’m involved with social media or social media marketing they suddenly ask questions like, “So, do you use that Twitter thing?” and “So, how does that work?  You market…. how?”.

Today, I was at a birthday party with my daughter and when the words “social media” were barely out of my mouth, someone said, “Oh, Social Media doesn’t make any money.” Hmmmm. I laughed a bit and said that I was making money from social media. He started blabbering on about reading something somewhere about how Twitter doesn’t make money yadayada. It is always interesting to me that most people have no idea what social media encompasses and the power and relevance it has in business and marketing.

When the word “money” comes into play I can’t help but give some consideration to whatever regurgitated factoid comes out of anyone’s mouth, including someone who clearly thinks I’m some silly marketing wack that only tweets about the burrito I’m eating for lunch. Twitter may not be making any money, and Facebook may be trying to figure out how to profit, but why is social media all the buzz if it isn’t making any money?

Does social media make money?

It does for me. In many ways. I receive blog advertising revenue on two blogs (and would happily pimp out space here as well…), I use Twittad for advertising revenue on my twitter page, and I’ve had people offer to pay me to write blog posts for their products (no, I’ve never accepted a paid post). I’ve been approached to write everything from simple copy to press releases because of the writing on my blogs. Every single solitary one of my private consulting clients now pays me to use social media in their PR and marketing efforts. There isn’t a single one of them that couldn’t benefit from the use of social media in their marketing plans.

Ok, so I am making money from social media. Who else is making money? What about all of the companies that benefit from advertising and promoting via social media?

Hello Mr. Regurgitator from the birthday party, you may not realize it, but your party host is a blog stalker, and while she and I don’t read the same types of blogs, the recipe for the tofu pie you are eating came directly from one of the blogs she stalks and is likely the brand that was recommended in the recipe because the tofu company sent the blogger a big chunk of free tofu to try out. So there you have it, one tofu company made an extra sale because of the Chocolate Honey Tofu Pie recipe posted on someone’s blog.

The misconceptions about the relevance of social media in business are understandable when we all hear that big players like Twitter are yet to produce a viable business model and turn a profit. However, if you take an existing product or company and explore the benefits that can be gained from using these non-profiting social media outlets (not my problem they aren’t making money yet…) I think you’ll find a little pot o’ gold that runs fairly deep. Of course, once those non-profiting social media vehicles, like Twitter, start to figure out how to make money it may mean a smaller piece of the pie for me.  I’m just having fun watching it all happen.

In general, I’m not bothered that there are misconceptions about the potential uses for social media in business. It usually doesn’t take more than a few minutes of conversation to show someone how powerful social media can be in business. The overall cost of a social media campaign (in my experience and with my clients) is significantly less than that of a direct mail campaign or print media advertising. I make the same amount of money, if not more, (because the results are so impressive that I become worth more) and my client gets fantastic results. Win win. Piece of cake… or tofu pie if you prefer.