Growth of Social Networks is also good for your Job Health

1. I have almost 600 Facebook friends now, but I don’t make friends for any other reason than I like having friends, both real and virtual – and, in many cases, a virtual friendship on Facebook or Twitter is an introduction to, at least, an in person meeting and perhaps Friendship that extends offline – or simultaneously with the online virtual friendship.

However, in combining multiple pieces on information -which I’m doing here – that

1. Social Networking is important in finding jobs, keeping jobs, has a positive influence on employment, according to the New York Times, in a post titled The Social Network as a Career Safety Net
   • … When Mr. So, a 32-year-old from Dublin, Calif., learned he had 45 days to find a new job before his company eliminated his division, he turned to friends online.Within hours of updating his job status on the social-networking site LinkedIn, Mr. So won four job interviews through his contacts there. Within a week, two of the interviews resulted in offers. And within less than a month, his employer counteroffered with a position in another division and a $25,000 bump in his annual salary.

     The old business adage that it’s not what you know but who you know takes a twist in the Internet era: it’s what you know about social-networking sites that can get you ahead.

     “Build your own inner circle of people you know are good — people you know will get you places,” Mr. So said.

2. Comscore just released as study which replicates my own findings of a couple of weeks ago that Social Networking Explodes Worldwide as Sites Increase their Focus on Cultural Relevance where the growth of members of the largest Social Networks implies that more people are using Social Networks to define and manage relationships, both online and offline, AND … that more possibilities exist, as time goes on and the Social Networks become larger, of having a more varied and meaningful set of Virtual Friends.

   Worldwide Growth among Selected Social Networking Sites June 2008 vs. June 2007 Total Worldwide Audience, Age 15+ Home and Work Locations Source: comScore World Metrix
   	Total Unique Visitors (000)
   	Jun-2007	Jun-2008	% Change
   Total Internet : Total Audience	778,310	860,514	11%
   Social Networking	464,437	580,510	25%
   FACEBOOK.COM	52,167	132,105	153%
   MYSPACE.COM	114,147	117,582	3%
   HI5.COM	28,174	56,367	100%
   FRIENDSTER.COM	24,675	37,080	50%
   Orkut	24,120	34,028	41%
   BEBO.COM	18,200	24,017	32%
   Skyrock Network	17,638	21,041	19%

According to Comscore:

“…. Facebook and Hi5 Lead Global Growth among Top Social Networking Sites During the past year, many of the top social networking sites have demonstrated rapid growth in their global user bases. Facebook.com, which took over the global lead among social networking sites in April 2008, has made a concerted effort to become more culturally relevant in markets outside the U.S. Its introduction of natural language interfaces in several markets has helped propel the site to 153-percent growth during the past year. Meanwhile, the emphasis Hi5.com has put on its full-scale localization strategy has helped the site double its visitor base to more than 56 million. Other social networking sites, including Friendster.com (up 50 percent), Orkut (up 41 percent), and Bebo.com (up 32 percent) have demonstrated particularly strong growth on a global basis.”

As far as I’m concerned, Social Networking is not a whaste of time.

In fact, recently, a friend of mine who works in the Newspaper Business lost her job – she acted as a the head of a data analytics group and a major metropolitan newspaper that was a subsideary of  larger corporation that needed to cut back expenses.    Search Engine Land actually wrote a post about this subject recently, titled Can Newspapers Be Saved?, which offers to answer why newspaper jobs are being cut and what to do about it.

However, more signifcantly, I drew upon my Social Network to help my friend, and got several leads for her already, without having to do much more than put out a call for help and assistance – help and assistance for a friend of a friend.

And when you ask for help from someone, it helps to first be a friend.

But I do want to clear something up – business is business and friendship, real or virtual (or “Quasi” friends, which are a hybrid between a real friend and a virtual one) can mix, and often do.

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