By now, most of us are familiar with Facebook, Blogs, LinkedIn and Twitter, but there are a number of new social networks that are changing the social media landscape.

I wanted to take a moment to share some of the hottest new social media tools that you may want to consider for your organization.

Pinterest
Pinterest has quickly become the darling of social media and it is the quickest growing independent social network in the history of the internet. Pinterest is a social network where users share their interests on pinboards by “pinning” content to boards that are arranged by topic.
Businesses of all sizes are using Pinterest including Threadless, Home Depot, and Whole Foods. Even BtoB companies like GE have cool Pinterest boards.

If you aren’t sure about how Pinterest can work for you, check out this Pinterest Training for Business program. 

Instagram
If you haven’t heard of Instagram yet, you will soon. Instagram has over 100 million users and was recently acquired by Facebook for 1 billion dollars. Instagram is an application for iPhone and Android that allows users to apply visually stunning filters to create beautiful images. It also has its own social networking functions where users can follow each other, tag and comment on photos.

Instagram is a big up and comer in the social media marketing world. Once of the biggest trends in social media is images – we all need images for Facebook, Twitter, blog posts and Pinterest – and Instagram can be a great way to get amazing photos.

Brands are now using Instagram to share behind the scenes photos and to encourage customers to take and share photos. Check out this Instagram training to get up to date. 

Google+
OK, so Google+ (or Google Plus) isn’t exactly new – it is well over a year old, but it has recently become much more important in the world of internet marketing. Research shows that social media users aren’t using Google+ as the social network that people thought it was, but the real implication of Google+ is on search.

Google+ is changing how businesses show up in search results, and pages and profiles are becoming important indicators of content creation. If you haven’t considered Google+ check out this Google+ Training to learn exactly how this can impact your organization.