An interesting thing happened last week after my sister got married...

It all began when I friended my new brother-in-law, Daniel, on Facebook. He accepted, and in turn friended me and my husband. Then my parents and their spouses friended their new son-in-law, and, in turn, Daniel’s parents began friending his new in-laws. Before you knew it, Facebook was positively afire with Lirettes and Szanyis and all their in-laws, out-laws and extended kin friending each other.

And I realized this must be what it looks like when 21st century families merge.

Amusing little story, but is there a point? Yep. What assumptions have you made about social media users? What did you base them on?

Before I began using Facebook, I assumed social media was really only for college kids with no job and plenty of spare time to socialize. You won’t hear me say it often, but I was completely wrong. Once I got on Facebook I was surprised to get friend requests not only from my parents and the girl who sat next to me in the fifth grade, but also a multitude of colleagues who wanted to build work relationships.

A 2010 survey conducted by Edison Research found that usage of social media is increasing so much that it has truly changed the way mainstream consumers communicate. Some important points:

1. Social networking is becoming more common among all age groups, with the most frequent users being full-time employees and students. Retirees make up 20 percent, but network less frequently.
2. Women are bigger social media users than men.
3. The biggest social networkers are more likely to be frequent Internet users and early-adopters of new gadgets. But they still consider the mobile phone the technology that has had the biggest impact on their lives.
4. Frequent social networkers are also more likely to update their status on those networks — i.e., create content online — which has implications for word-of-mouth marketing and search.
5. Not only are frequent social networkers posting more status updates, they are also more likely to follow brands/companies than the average social media user — which makes identifying and appealing to those with the “social habit” crucial for brands.
6. Access to networking via mobile phones is a main factor in the growth of social networking.
7. Nearly half of frequent social networkers access podcasts, online video, and online audio, which suggests a significant amount of content is being consumed on-demand directly from the source.
8. Frequent social networkers are watching significantly less traditional television, but potentially consuming (and sharing) more “video” through alternative means.
9. About half of consumers would rather give up television than Internet, a number that rises to 75 percent among frequent social networkers.