For Lorraine Renalli, using
social media sites such as Facebook is crucial for small businesses. She calls
using such sites as “public relations on steroids.”

Renalli, an author, public
relations specialist and former broadcaster, said the first thing businesses
cut during tough economic times is their marketing, but it should be the last
thing they cut. Yet, Facebook and other social media Web sites are essential
for guerilla marketing because business and nonprofit organizations don’t need
a big budget. They only need time, energy and creativity.

“It’s marketing on a
shoestring,” she said, and it connects with people who buy. “Using social media
is not just a tool for teenagers,” she said. “The largest growing demographic
on Facebook is women 55 and older…Successful businesses use social media like
Dale Carnegie.”

Renalli explained that Carnegie
preached listening. Social media Web sites provide an enormous amount of
feedback for businesses, helping them to better understand the wants and needs
of their customers.

She likened social media to
expanded word of mouth praise with people trusting peer recommendations more
than advertising. Seventy-eight percent of people trust word of mouth from
friends, while only 14 percent trust advertising, she said.

Renalli used the launch of her
book “Gravy Wars” as an example of the benefit of using social media to promote
a project. The book launched in the fall of 2009 and she used Facebook to
spread the word.

“Gravy Wars” is about
Italian-American culture in general, but specifically about whether to use the
word sauce or gravy when it comes to what people put on pasta.

Some old friends from school
and her early days in radio “friended” her on Facebook with one of them
starting a Facebook fan page for the book.

“Now I have people from all
over the world looking into the book…It just snowballs. It’s really been
amazing,” Renalli said. “It’s a virtual talk radio show.”

Indeed. Renalli, a former
reporter with Shadow Traffic, now has her own weekly radio talk show on WBCB, a
station in Bucks County that also streams on the Internet. She said all of the
regulars on the show are people she’s met on Facebook. Those regulars include
professional comedians and chefs from New Jersey to Boston and a food blogger
in Washington state.

She made her comments to
members of the Chadds Ford Business Association during the group’s Jan. 6
luncheon at Brandywine Prime.

Also during the luncheon, it
was announced that Jim Leader of Leader Sunoco was ending his tenure as CFBA
president. He’s succeeded by Emily Myers, a past CFBA president and now the
publisher of ChaddsFordLive.com.

In his outgoing message, Leader
told members that the group will continue trying to move forward with Chadds
Ford Township supervisors to allow for large business signs on each end of the
village on Route 1.

Another tentative measure, he
said, is to get the township to allow use of the municipal building for a
business fare.

Leader and Myers both mentioned
a joint venture between ChaddsFordLive and the CFBA with all business
association members receiving a subscription to CFL with their dues.