Small business owners surveyed by office-products giant Staples would rather have large Facebook fan communities than celebrity endorsements, or even Super Bowl ads.
Lisa Raphael (left), the social media producer at Katie Couric's daytime talk show Katie, is one of our featured speakers in Mediabistro's upcoming Social Media Marketing Boot Camp, an online event and workshop starting June 6, 2013. Lisa will share a case study on how the hit show uses Twitter to build interest and buzz around upcoming segments. Learn more about our our twelve event speakers and register here. 
Local businesses are thriving on Facebook, according to statistics released Friday by Dan Levy, director of small business at the social network, who said more than 2 billion connections exist on Facebook between users and local businesses, adding that approximately 70 percent of monthly active users in the U.S. and Canada are connected to local businesses.
Social gifting, which is becoming wildly popular on Facebook, has largely been conducted through gift cards and major retailers. Boomerang wants to make social gifting a local experience. The Chicago-based program is expanding to New York, Indianapolis, and Austin, Texas, offering small businesses and local retailers a chance to get in on the social gifting fun.
Small businesses on Facebook are gearing up for the 2012 holiday shopping season, with nearly one-half expecting sales to increased compared with last year, nearly one-half planning some sort of promotion on Facebook, and most that have advertised on the social network expecting to do so again, according to a new study by Facebook commerce provider Payvment.
Facebook was the platform of choice for small businesses looking to use free offerings from social networks to promote their goods and services, but when it came to paying for promotion via social media, the result was quite the opposite, according to an email survey of 3,434 MerchantCircle member merchants, conducted by Reply.
Thanks to a partnership between Facebook and American Express, five small businesses earned $25,000 and social media help as part of the Big Break For Small Businesses contest. Casale Jewelers of Staten Island, N.Y.; Hendrick Boards of Orange County, Calif.; Dick Pond Athletics of Chicago; The Produce Box of Raleigh, N.C.; and Dutch Monkey Doughnuts of Cumming, Ga., were the lucky winners.
Facebook has been unveiling more options for companies to advertise through the social media site. However, Reuters reports today that many businesses have been eschewing paid options to do what they can to promote their biz for free.
Have you seen a Facebook post for a cash mob? We haven’t, but by the sounds of it, we sure would like to.
Small business page administrators are receiving emails that look an awful lot like phishing attempts but are actually legitimate research by Facebook, which promises $500 in free advertising to those that complete the one-month study.
Growth in local merchants’ use of Facebook ads has tapered off a bit.
