New York, New York – June 15, 2010 – Today, New York-based Access Markets International (AMI) Partners, Inc. announced its first annual Small and Medium Business Social Media Marketing Awards. AMI analysts will acknowledge Information Communications and Technology (ICT) providers that effectively use social media to inform the purchase process of small and medium businesses.

Full release here.

Nearly 70% of U.S. SMBs use social media including Facebook, MySpace, blogs, YouTube, Twitter and much more. Although the number of SMBs using social media has grown drastically over the last few years the industry’s understanding of what drives SMBs to uses these tools remains limited. In addition, the understanding of how SMBs should be reached through social media is even less known.

Read the full release here.

New York, New York—April 28, 2010— In the current economic environment, home-based businesses (HBBs) in the U.S. are increasingly turning to the web to boost business. Social networking sites, web sites and VoIP are playing an increasingly prominent role in the survival of the HBB.

View the full release here.

Full press release on that next week, here.

Other findings from the India MB report below:

Close to 30% of MBs mentioned they are on the lookout for effective business management tools in the next 12 months.

Over two thirds of India MBs intend to use social networking sites for marketing their products and services in the next 12 months.

See the full report here.

This something better was FriendFeed. It wasn’t a Twitter killer, Chris insisted, but was an alternative worth investigating. I promised him I’d investigate and report back. My report was that of confusion: I didn’t get it. A year ago, sending reports of all my web activities to one single location for any old stranger to follow seemed creepy and unnecessary. I had a Facebook account, but only my friends could see what I was up to. I had a Twitter account but carefully controlled what information I chose to publicize. What could FriendFeed do that Twitter couldn’t? Why was FriendFeed even necessary? It wasn’t. Until the moment that FriendFeed accomplished what every Web 2.0 tool can only dream of: It became relevant.

As social networking privacy concerns evolve from legitimate to tangential, the ability to stream your Netflix queue, Facebook conversations, blog posts, Twitter status updates and Flickr photos in real time–with real time commenting ability—complements this evolution by offering a sense of control and community that is missing in Twitter. Yes, anybody can follow your life stream, but you direct what goes out there. Today’s Web 2.0 tools are at the cost of your anonymity but not your vulnerability. You still control your content. For now.

Social media is here to stay
When Facebook began relaxing their privacy settings last month by making status updates and photos public by default, my initial reaction was that they were emulating the FriendFeed model, so yesterday’s acquisition comes as little surprise. While I’m still not sure what this means for Facebook, it certainly signals a strong message to today’s SMBs: It’s time to stop asking Who cares? and to start asking What do my customers care about? Embrace the Web 2.0 medium and you’ll find that interacting with your customers—both satisfied and disgruntled—will offer you the insight of a feedback loop while building a loyal, vocal customer base, each of whom holds their own megaphone.