Unless you were kidnapped by aliens and have been living on another world for the past few years, you would have heard the incessant buzz that is Social Media.

Now, I'm no expert on this new sensation but I do recognise its potential for spreading my business message so am eager to learn all about it.

Here's what I've gleaned so far ... and to be honest, it may not be much more than what our friends on Planet 'Ahh-ya-got-me' already know, but it's a start:

1. Make the decision whether or not to use a form of social media for business BEFORE you sign up. That'll prevent your Facebook page becoming an 'old acquaintance and school chums catch-up place' filled with juvenile games like Farmville and Cafe World (and other suoıʇɔɐɹʇsıp ʎןןıs)

2. Don't feel compelled to follow someone on Twitter simply because they follow you. Sure, it may seem like the polite thing to do but what really matters is the quality of your contacts, not the quantity. If you don't genuinely have an interest in their 140 character pearls of wisdom, don't follow them.

After all, Life's too short to read bad tweets!

3. Then of course, there's YouTube. Apparently, YouTube's the second biggest search thingy on the Web - edged out only by 'The Google'. So it makes sense to have some kind of video presence if you want to raise your profile in cyberspace. Hey, it worked for SuBo.

Add to these the various other social media platforms that you can Link In, Digg in and Squidoodly diddly in - it's no wonder I'm a tad confused!

Thankfully, there's stacks of information out there to help make sense of it all.

Kirsty Dunphey has a fab article on her blog here, which is well worth a look.

Here's to taking off the training wheels!