Small businesses 'get it.' They know that Facebook and Twitter can put their company on equal footing with the big guys. A new survey indicates that they have jumped on the social network bandwagon, and it is working for them.

Nearly half of the 2,000 small businesses surveyed last month said they had a presence or profile on Facebook and Twitter to promote their businesses, according to Internet2Go, an Opus Research advisory service, and MerchantCircle.

And why wouldn't they? It's cheap, effective and works around the clock. It allows them to advertise their products online and puts them in the middle of a trend that is exploding.

"We've known anecdotally that small businesses are using social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, but these numbers are surprising," Greg Sterling, senior analyst at Internet2Go, said in a statement. "The conventional wisdom is that SMBs are unsophisticated but they're adopting social media tools en masse it appears, because there are fewer barriers to entry than other forms of online marketing."

The survey also found the biggest complaint regarding online marketing is that it is too costly (26 percent) and that it takes too much time when you are trying to run a business (16 percent). Three-quarters of respondents said they monitor online reviews of their businesses.

"We believe the behavior exhibited by these small business owners is a precursor of things to come--that small business owners will increasingly forgo expensive advertising options and embrace publishing their unique content across various social media outlets," Darren Waddell, vice president of marketing at MerchantCircle, told InternetNews.com.

For more on small businesses and social networking:
- see this InternetNews.com article

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