The Price Group

149 million Americans now actively use the social network (as of 2009, the network had 100 million active users in the U.S.). And 70 percent of these active users in the U.S. log on to the social network daily.

ike snapping a photo with a fan of an opposing team, earn fans points that go toward winning the grand prize of a trip to see the NBA finals with Scottie Pippen, formerly of the Chicago Bulls.

Fifty-four percent of small and midsize businesses (SMBs) are using social media to promote their businesses, double the number using these sites in December 2009, with 35% posting daily updates to sites such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter, a new study found.

although only 17% of SMBs surveyed used incentives to attract online followers, friends and fans, 60% credit social media with positively impacting their businesses

46% said their company's brand awareness has increased and 36% have attracted new business as a result of their social media efforts

381,576,30 checkins were made in 2010. A checkin has been made in every single country in the world, plus space. North Korea was the last country to check in. The Rally to Restore Sanity on October 30 was the biggest event of the year, with 30,525 checkins made in Washington, D.C. that day. Food venues were the most popular checkin category in 2010; campuses were the least. MTV, Bravo, the History Channel, Zagat and VH1 were the most popular brand pages.

Facebook Places is the most popular check-in mechanism, with 52 percent of respondents using it.

Only 18 percent of check-ins were using Foursquare and 12 percent were via Google Latitude.About 31 percent of consumers check-in at least once a day and 21 percent do so a few times per day.The most popular places to check in are home (52 percent), at a restaurant (50 percent), at a store (40 percent) or at work (39 percent).

Twenty-nine percent of respondents said they use them to pass time, 22 percent to publicize their location to friends or to locate friends (10 percent).

There are five main reasons people use location-based applications: serendipity, game dynamics, as a personal diary, for sharing experiences and to score deals.

Hide and Eat” campaign, the company hid chocolate bars inside the storefronts of other local businesses, posted clues on Facebook () and Twitter () each day and incited local residents to rush the different stores to discover the bars.  

Neighborhood companies can offer their local fans something that no one else can have. It’s all about creating something really special, narrowing down the channels through which people can find out about it, and mixing things up a little by partnering up with other nearby businesses.

Vosges also uses the platform to promote its retailers. The company keeps tabs on any tweets from people looking for its products and directs them to the nearest place to find its bacon chocolate bars, for example, even giving them a heads up about local sales and deals.