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For those looking to strengthen their social media presence, often an integration of data consumption and practical tutorial can provide invaluable insight. As this blog post outlines, both of those factors can be tackled with free online resources.

As journalist Mike Wallace once said, “All I’m armed with is research.” This statement recapitulates how important empirical knowledge is to the professional strategists, including social media planners. The Social Habit provides that research. A Chapel Hill consulting group, The Social Habit uses surveys and other methodology to supply business clientele with marketing insights concerning that particular company’s social media. However, one does not necessarily have to order The Social Habit’s services in order to use them as a resource.

The Social Habit’s blog contains myriad useful posts about topics such as brand loyalty, the average ages of social media users, and how political affiliations affects social media usage. Most of the posts contain soundly researched data and easy-to-read graphs. Though much sparser, @thesocialhabit features tweeted links to outside research on social media, as well as other posts useful to the social media novice.

Once you have consumed all of the data, what do you do with your newfound social media wisdom? I suggest you follow Blast Media, an Indianapolis-based public relations firm that specializes is Social Media Optimization (SMO).  As anyone viewing their website can tell, Blast Media targets young professionals and businesses looking to spice up their brand with a healthy dose of trendiness.  Though they are technically a for-profit organization like The Social Habit, extremely constructive free content pours forth from their blog and twitter feed.

With an average of eight tweets every weekday, links to various diverse social media/public relations topics can be found on Blast Media twitter; from how-to’s like “8 Ways to Manage Negative PR” to digital current events such as “Pinterest Launches Business Accounts.” Long-form topics on the Blast Media blog range from social media blunders to innovative consumer-client coverage. If you’re a business with a younger audience looking to improve your social media status, then all of the info provided by Blast Media will undoubtedly be helpful to you.

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In a recent article posted on PBS MediaShift, a former BuzzFeed intern warned against the hazards of live-tweeting during political debates: “It is easier than ever to find people who agree with you, and to shut out those who don’t.” Thus highlights a significant problem in obtaining political news from one’s personal social networks. The digital revolution grants users the ability to pick and choose the information they consume, and in doing so close-mindeness and political partisanship are instigated.

Though partisanship is bound to happen in any democracy, aren’t we much more likely to construct RSS channels, Twitter feeds, and Facebook threads consisting of like-minded opinions and news sources which reaffirm our own positions? The Fairness Doctrine does not extend to social media; our web-based news intake can be as unfair and as unbalanced as we want it to be. Though mainstream news strives to be nonpartisan, social networks provide a platform for thousands of alternative news sources with biases ranging all across the political spectrum. It is not difficult for a social media user to find a news source that fits his or her own value system.

Members of Generation Y (the current generational cohort) place a heavy value on social media, and therefore are most likely to intake slated social media-based news. The Pew Research Center reports 92% of Internet users between the ages of 18 and 29 use social networking sites, and a growing number of this age group consume news via social media over cable or local broadcasting. Another study from the Generation Y-centered research group TRU-Insights reported 52% of Millennials received presidential election news from social media. What’s more, Generation Y has been found to be more trusting of news sources than any other generation.

Journalist Dahr Jamail once said, “Since an informed citizenry is the basis for a healthy democracy, independent, non-corporate media are more crucial today than ever before.” By providing the people with access to views alternative to the mainstream press, social media serves as a powerful tool in informing the American people. However, to be a truly informed citizen, one most go further than simply relying on alternative news. Reflection, research, and studying opposing viewpoint are vital to today’s news consumer, especially in this social media age.

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