'Social media' is a term that has gained prominence and recognition during the last couple of years.

Traditional media including newspaper, radio and TV formats are one-way communication formats in the publisher for the reader, listener or viewer.

Social websites are social formats of two-way media communication where the publishers, readers, listeners and viewers are common capable to contribute to the conversation and form communities of specific mutual interests.Social Media was enabled by so-called 'Web 2.0' technologies that surfaced circa 2002-5 to facilitate multi-participant communication, information sharing, interoperability, collaboration, communities, and user or consumer generated content (media) on the Internet.

It encompasses capabilities such as blogs, online chat, social support systems, social network, wikis, social bookmarks, forums, video sharing, photo sharing, virtual worlds, podcasts, social news, etc.So that it follows that 'Social Media Marketing' could be the utilization of social networking capabilities for marketing purposes.

Nearly - traditional varieties of marketing usually do not directly translate or be employed in this new environment.

You utilize social websites capabilities in the same ways your web visitors and prospects do, and you also notice the rules set with the community you happen to be emailing.