Stat of the day comes from Cone (I’m sure there’s a fascinating reason for that name):

Sixty percent of Americans use social media, and of those, 59 percent interact with companies on social media Web sites. One in four interacts more than once per week.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, 93 percent of social media users “believe a company should have a presence in social media”. “56 percent of users feel both a stronger connection with and better served by companies when they can interact with them in a social media environment.”

But it’s MediaPost’s Research Brief that complements this with something more interesting for me:

Data from an August 2008 survey of Web merchants, sponsored by Internet Retailer, found that, of the 39.3% of retail respondents that use social networks, 32% have a page on Facebook, 27% on MySpace and 26% on YouTube.

So a significant proportion of retailers are moving into social media, consumers want more, and the trend continues.

Now, what should news organisations be doing again?