Social Media has only really been in our lives for a short ten years. LinkedIn launched in 2003 for business professionals, Facebook in 2004 for college students and Twitter just slightly later in 2006. More networks have emerged and we see a regular line of social network icons wherever we turn. We connect with our family, our friends and our work and industry colleagues. Businesses realize that an active social media presence is essential to their success, and employees and entrepreneurs alike utilize social media to work. Internally organizations connect through their own networks, or use external networks, Facebook pages, and these connections transfer externally as employees use their social networks to influence customers and consumers. Twitter feeds, and of course LinkedIn, where connections made whilst working with one firm, carry over to the next. So can we earn a living through Social Media, businesses have recognized it must be a key marketing strategy, and many are taking advantage of the demand by:

Supplying social media services

There are many entrepreneurs and small firms, and large organizations too, specializing in digital marketing and offering outsourced social media management services. Designing and integrating the organizations networks, and managing them on a day by day basis with content to engage and drive traffic to websites and increase sales. These services are provided on hourly, weekly and monthly basis and work can be found easily through freelancing platforms like Elance, Freelancer, People Per Hour and Coworks.

Use social media to make your business work

If your business or employer makes money then you will too. Whether social media management is internal or external the key is to use it well. A social media presence actively determines search engine ranking. To be top of Google you must be regularly marketing your content, and links to your website to represent your products or services. If you are good then your posts and tweets will also drive traffic to you site and result in direct enquiries or purchases. Building a healthy social media profile shows the world your credibility, your news and views and most people engaging with a new brand will click on at least one of those social media icons.

Find work with social media

Most job opportunities are now posted on social networks, either directly from the company or through job boards, recruitment agencies or freelance platforms. Google estimates that 1 in 5 job searches start with social media. Few times ago, I wrote an article about on hiring through LinkedIn and in my conclusion, LinkedIn are the job finding specialists with premium programs for recruiters to find candidates and massive investment to double the number of jobs posted on LinkedIn in the past year. Connections and endorsements on LinkedIn make it easy to connect with a new employer or client, and to see who you know already connects with them.

Let your social media connections find you work

You can go a step further and allow your social media connections and endorsements to gain you jobs directly. For freelancers there is a new platform which offers the normal payment protection and administrative systems but goes a step further to show potential clients recommendations gleaned from social networks. Coworks offers firms the ability to choose freelancers with what they term the new “word of mouth” referrals, rather than sifting through tens of propositions, taking a risk on an unknown resource. It also allows new freelancers to compete based on completed work or referrals gained outside of the platform, and aims to increase both price and quality by ruling out untried, inexperienced bidders.