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Have you ever found yourself at the dinner table with your family totally overwhelmed by conversations about social media? As you sit there nodding as if you understand, your children - who may not even be in their teens yet - chat back and forth about hashtags and likes and statuses. What does it all mean?

Someone asked me the other day where I get my news from, and “Twitter” was my automatic response. While I still get the content from news-worthy sites like CNN or AP, it’s not like I’m combing their homepage anymore but rather clicking a quick link to exactly what I’m looking for. And I don’t have to search far for the public’s comments. Simply by exiting the article, I can see how my friends and even people I don’t know are responding to the story through Twitter as well. Since Twitter is acting as a “second screen” for me and many other consumers, brands should be aiming to become part of this social commentary and push out their messages to the millions of users using real-time marketing. And that’s exactly what Oreo is doing.

Last week Instagram and Facebook launched their new video service, Instagram video, in order to compete with Twitter’s Vine app. Instragram’s video offers the user 15 seconds to shoot a desired subject and is completely editable. So, while we’ve provided you with tips on how to use Instagram video for your marketing advantage, should you continue with Vine? Will users stay loyal to the infantile platform or switch over to Instagram, which was delivered to them in a simple app update?

Since its creation in 2006, Twitter has become one of the strongest and most powerful platforms that companies have at their disposal. As inbound marketers, you know how to use Twitter to push out content, drive traffic and create user engagement. And now Twitter is bringing out the big guns by making the site even more useful.

#HelloFacebook!

Whether you are an inbound marketer or not, chances are that you've seen that iconic #hashtag symbol a lot recently. The hashtag (formerly known as the pound sign to any non-social media dwellers) was originally used to follow specific topics of conversation on the social network, Twitter. Now the hashtag is common place all over social media platforms such as Pinterest, Instagram and Tumblr. While companies everywhere have capitalized on the hashtag to start conversations around their brand, Facebook has been awkwardly absent from this sharing capability.

Since it’s official launch in 2006, Twitter has attracted over 200 million active users and is one of the most popular social networks on the Internet. Chances are you’re one of those users and you probably think you’ve got Twitter all figured out.

The advantages of Twitter can be seen when businesses or individuals communicate online the same way they would in face-to-face interactions. Social media has revolutionized the way people connect, and maintaining these connections through two-way communication patterns can lead to a larger following.

As you know, your business must have a social presence if you want to generate leads online. Many of your opportunities are hanging out all over social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. In fact, Twitter has more than 200 million active monthly users, a statistic that your business can't ignore. If you want to take those prospects and turn them into real leads, then your business needs to get tweeting, right now!

Why should you use twitter? Well, for one, it's free! The only investment you need to put into the site is time. Since social media is such a powerful marketing and lead generating tool, there really is no drawback to setting up an account. Worse case scenario: you don't use it and you lose no money. Best case scenario: you tweet often and you tweet correctly and you profit!

There’s no doubt about it: humans are social creatures. Sure, we all enjoy privacy from time to time, but anyone in isolation usually becomes very lonely. To remedy this issue, people have established communities for support and brotherhood. This is as true now as it was 5,000 years ago. Communities can create and improve ideas, help those in need, and generally improve the standard of living for everyone. Many of these benefits apply to an Internet community, too.