Just because you live out in the sticks doesn't mean that you can't have hundreds of friends — and maybe even thousands of customers — online.

 

With social media websites such as Twitter and Facebook, the days of rural isolation are over. Many rural children and teenagers have already figured out how to use the new-fangled Internet gizmos, that let them communicate with other computer users all over the world.

 

According to Lloyd Hannesson, a Winnipeg-based social media guru, it's time their parents got in on the action too.

 

That's because the websites could help them market their farm production more effectively, as well as open a window to help city folks learn more about farm life.

 

The blogger, webcaster and podcaster has created a business for himself out of reviewing video games. When he wanted to expand his audience, he turned to social media.

 

“I had about 100 people listening to my show, and I was kind of disappointed. So, I decided to fix it with Facebook and Twitter,” he said in a presentation at Manitoba Ag Days.

 

“Over a period of about a month, in talking to developers and people selling these games, I was able to grow my listener base from 100 to 2,500 people.

 

''It's a small, niche thing. It's not like I'm a million-dollar business. But to talk to 2,500 people more in just a month, that's pretty powerful.”

First, it helps to know the terrain.

 

Facebook, by far the most popular online place to meet people and stay in touch, is currently used by some 70 million people. It was invented a few years ago by a Harvard University student who sought a more efficient means of meeting girls, said Hannesson.

 

Twitter, a site where people communicate via short text-based “tweets” from their computers or mobile phones, has exploded in popularity.

 

It has become so influential in recent years that CNN and other large news organizations have begun “tweeting” breaking news, after they were beaten by a bystander with a cellphone camera who snapped a shot of the now famous Hudson River plane crash and posted it on Twitter, where it was seen by millions.

 

Podcasts are another often overlooked means of exchanging information online. Like a radio program, computer users can download the files and listen to them whenever they want, or wherever, if they have a compatible audio player, such as an IPod.

 

“If I was a farmer living in a small town and I did something really awesome, maybe only a 100 people will know about it,” said Hannesson. “But if I start talking about these sorts of things on Twitter, I can talk about it with the world.”