I was interviewed this morning on Sky Business Tech Report. Some of the things we discussed in the interview are:

* How social media such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and many others change how companies engage with customers, become more efficient, and being competitive.

* Among the many Australian organizations applying social media, for example Westpac has been implementing blogging and other tools internally to improve effectiveness, and discount airlines and telcos are using Twitter to engage with customers.

* Online outsourcing platforms such as elance.com, Odesk, and freelance.com are giving the power of outsourcing to small business, enabling them to compete effectively with large companies.

* To begin to use online outsourcing, think about what tasks you want done, get bids, find new suppliers, and see what works best for you.

* It is important to recognize that the world is rapidly changing and that learning new tools and approaches is fundamental to business success moving forward.

* Managers and business owners have many resources to learn how to do these things. SME Technology Summit, other events, this blog and many other online resources are available.

* To get the most talented people to work for you, reward suppliers in ways more than financial, by making it stimulating, engaging, and fun to work and offering to share rewards.

This fabulous widget from Gary Hayes shows precisely how fast the online world is growing.

If you are running a business, is this something you want to ignore? Or if you want to find out how to tap the potential of this explosion, come to our SME Technology Summit in Sydney on 1 December!

Be sure to check out Gary Hayes’ blog PersonalizeMedia, which offers fascinating insights across social media, virtual worlds, gaming, personalization and story telling.

The list of the top 10 blogs for small business provides an excellent resource for attendees of our SME Technology Summit in Sydney on 1 December, where there will be deep insights into all of the topics covered by these blogs.

Many of these blogs are for businesses of all sizes, but all of them provide valuable insights for small to mid-sized businesses. Check them out!

1. Online Marketing Blog

http://www.toprankblog.com

Covers digital marketing topics, focusing on social media, online PR and search engine marketing. A broad team of writers brings diverse perspectives to bear.

2. Affiliate X Files

http://www.affiliatexfiles.com

Specializes in affiliate marketing issues, with a wide range of in-depth articles.

3. Social Media Today

http://www.socialmediatoday.com/SMC

Brings together selected blog posts from 60 leading thinkers on social media and Web 2.0.

4. Brian Solis – PR 2.0

http://www.briansolis.com

The first single person blog (with occasional guest posts) is by Brian Solis, leading thinker on the future of marketing and PR. Brian spoke at The Insight Exchange’s Future of Influence Summit.

5. Web Strategy by Jeremiah Owyang

http://www.web-strategist.com/blog

Jeremiah provides extensive research and insights on his blog, to complement his work over the years as a social media practitioner, analyst at Forrester Research, and now partner at Altimeter Group.

6. Altitude Branding

http://altitudebranding.com

Author Amber Naslund is Director of Community for leading social media monitoring platform Radian6, blogging here about elevating brands through social media.

7. BrandSavant

http://brandsavant.com

Tom Webster writes about how to gain insights into brands from the vast amount of data generated by social media.

8. Convince and Convert Blog

http://www.convinceandconvert.com

Jay Baer writes about social media, including tools, tips, interviews and analysis of the emerging landscape.

9. Duct Tape Marketing

http://www.ducttapemarketing.com/blog

Duct Tape Marketing focuses explicitly on small business marketing, not just technology but across all the activities that will build customers and business.

10. VA4Growth

http://va4growth.com/blog

A resource site for social media marketing, run by a company specializing in providing Virtual Assistants.