“People think of social media as for personal use, but it’s got a really important business application too,” Fails said.

ICE holds meetings on the second Tuesday of every month in the Heritage Lounge in the Union’s lower level. ICE provides the MSU campus and the greater Lansing area with a venue for potential entrepreneurs to collaborate with one another, as well as develop new strategies to enhance their ventures, Fails said.

Middlin, who splits her time developing marketing strategies for software development companies and organizing community building events in the greater Lansing area, spoke about why the use of social media is crucial for small businesses.

“I want to show the people that are here tonight some of the numbers behind what people are doing online, why Facebook is as popular as it is, where the data is pointing, … what advertising was like two years ago, what it’s like now so the people get the whole picture of how to interact with people using Facebook and Twitter as a business,” Middlin said.

Aside from having a presence on sites like Facebook and Twitter, Middlin stressed the importance of business owners frequently posting and communicating with their followers, rather than outsourcing the job to an intern or someone not directly involved with the business.

“You really need to consider some of the business reasons for getting involved in social media and social networking and do it yourself for a while or have someone internally do it,” Middlin said. “The data even points to the fact that the majority of users on Facebook are between the ages of 25 and 55, so hiring a college intern may not even be someone who?s active in those networks.”

She also recognized that social media can be a daunting task, especially for those who are new to it. Much of this comes from the misconceptions that come along with them, she said.

“It doesn’t have to be as intimidating as some people maybe make it out to be — getting on Twitter and getting on Facebook or even LinkedIn — it doesn’t have to take over your life, it doesn’t have to overwhelm you to the point that you’re paralyzed,” Middlin said.

Even those who already use social media said they were able to learn from Middlin, such as Nathan Bashaw, a political theory and constitutional democracy senior, who considers himself familiar with social media. Bashaw said he hopes to one day start his own business, possibly developing applications for authors on Apple Inc. products.

“It’s nice to get tips from someone who’s a professional,” Bashaw said. “(The speech) was geared toward people who know less about social media than I do, but I think for that purpose it was excellent.”