If Government Elections are influenced by Social Media, how much impact do they have on Businesses?

Social media held the key to engaging with the electorate for the three main political parties, it has emerged.

According to UKFast, new audiences were be reached through the effective use of social media marketing, with politicians taking heed from the successes of Barack Obama's campaign.

Lawrence Jones, managing director of UKFast, commented: "Twitter and Facebook have given the power back to the voters. They now have an arena in which to challenge party leaders and demand more from them."

He stressed that parties have recognised the value of being able to not only keep in touch with voters, but also how to interact with them in an effective manner.

Interactive debates were held on popular sites such as Facebook and YouTube, the company revealed, which supplemented the first live TV encounter between Gordon Brown, Nick Clegg and David Cameron.

InSites Consulting recently revealed that 72 per cent of internet users are part of at least one social network, which equates to 940 million users worldwide.

On a global basis, Facebook remains the most popular online platform (accessed by 51 per cent of web users ), followed by MySpace (20 per cent) and Twitter (17 per cent).

Source: UKFast