Most people think that social networking sites are for people to waste time, keep up with friends, and stalk potential romantic partners. All these things are true. Social networking sites also serve as a tool for companies to spy on people. If your company isn’t gathering data from social networking sites you are wasting a powerful resource.

After corporate America co-opted love, freedom, virtue and truth in the 1990s and 2000s they moved on to friendship. Friendship proved a more formidable foe than the aforementioned notions however. It is hard to be friends with a corporation. I mean I love Burger King, but I am not in love with Burger King.

Now that I am friends with Burger King online I can see it every time I turn on my computer and every time I walk down the street. Soon visiting the Burger King Facebook page will make your computer emit that oh-so-familiar Burger King odor. Burger King in turn gets to see everything I do, say and buy. If that isn’t friendship I don’t know what is. Online marketing is great because it speaks to the notion that corporations are people too. Your company can become human too, by using online business marketing.