Today, hundreds of millions of people around the world use social media to communicate. The most popular are Facebook, MySpace, Vkontakte, Odnoklassniki, LinkedIn, and others. According to a comScore study, Israel ranked first in the world for the amount of time residents spend on social media, with Russia in second place.

Today, hundreds of millions of people in the world use social networks to communicate. The most popular are Facebook, MySpace, Vkontakte, Odnoklassniki, LinkedIn, etc. According to a comScore study, Israel ranked first in the world in the amount of time its residents spend on social networks, Russia is in second place.

The ever-growing interest of users in social networks has made employers seriously concerned about how employees spend their work time. According to research by Forrester Research, 78% of executive respondents from IT departments said that they are concerned about employees' use of social networks in the workplace. On the one hand, social networks create trusting relationships and provide access to network capital, but on the other hand, these connections often extend beyond the organization.

Most managers still operate on the principle of "no access - no problem." Obviously, no ban, especially on the Internet, has ever led to the expected results. In fact, there are many ways to get around them.

Therefore, the most innovative companies have taken a different path. They are guided by the principle "if you can't stop it, lead it." Most often, these are companies working in the IT sector. Their employees have exceptionally high computer and Internet literacy, and no prohibitions will stop them.  Therefore, such companies offer their employees an alternative - a corporate social network.

Leading analytical agencies have been discussing the prospects of implementing corporate social networks for several years. According to Gartner, "30% of companies will invest in internal spaces similar to MySpace." Forrester analysts express the same ideas: "To succeed in the era of social media, companies must abandon the top-down management model and interaction method."

Discussions about the use of this tool in business have been going on for quite a long time, but there has been no rush to implement such innovations. As technology improved, conversations grew, and this led to the emergence of the first successful projects.

One such example was the integration of social networks into the business strategy of the American company Cisco Systems Inc., a leader in networking technologies. IBM recently developed a similar system – a tool aimed at accumulating social network capital within the company – IBM Lotus Connections.

The European IT company Microinvest looked even further. It created a specialized social network www.microinside.ru, which unites not only employees, but also international partners and clients of the company in a kind of "microenvironment", where the boundaries between buyer and seller, manufacturer and client, partner and developer are erased. It allows each participant to create their own profile, post information about their company, awards, achievements, upload current photos of the office, employees, and much more.

The uniqueness of this approach lies in the fact that a partner or client can register and share their experience with others, backing everything up with visual aids and examples. Hundreds of automated objects with the company's software solutions have already found their place on the platform, and new ones are added daily.

Every user, from anywhere in the world, has the opportunity to view interesting photographs and descriptions of retail facilities, restaurants, and cafes in their city or another region. Read interesting facts that arose in the process of their automation, see illustrative examples, and much more.

Furthermore, thanks to the company's strong market position in the CIS market and the ever-increasing interest of users in social networks, microinside.su has become not just a social network, but a close-knit community of developers, partners, and clients.

This direction in global practice is still new, so the platform still has room for development. It is planned to add user comments, the ability to "friend", "highlight" liked information, and other useful functions.

Such platforms open up serious prospects for businesses, being simultaneously B2B and B2C oriented. In this type of network, each participant will be able to receive useful information, such as contacts, reviews, feedback, etc.

This platform is especially relevant for international corporations that use the Internet as the primary means of communication between regional offices, partners, and clients.

Social networks, where business meets consumer, and consumer meets business, are the response of companies seeking to satisfy the interests of their clients and partners to constantly changing market conditions and trends.

This is the technology of the future. It is difficult to imagine a better way to instantly interact and exchange information, where the manufacturer can communicate on an equal footing with the consumer, partner with partner, and client with seller.