Small Businesses Can't Afford Not to Make This One Hire

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Facebook's (FB) announcement Tuesday of its new "Graph Search" probably has more than a few small-business owners scratching their heads. While the application makes searching on Facebook for similar interests easier and more relevant, the message to small-business owners is that being on Facebook -- and more generally being social-media savvy -- is no longer an option, but a necessity.

Social media was a dominant theme Tuesday during the Main Street Retailing Forum at the National Retail Federation's annual convention, held at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York City. About 27,000 industry participants attended.

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During the daylong presentations geared specifically to small and independent businesses, almost every speaker brought up the subject of how social media plays an important role in customer acquisition and retention.

Social media is still an area that both big and small retailers are learning to navigate, said Janet Viane, vice president of marketing at Sears (SHLD), in her morning presentation titled "It Usually Starts on Main Street. ..."

"We're still trying to figure out what to post on Facebook," Viane said. Sears owns Sears Roebuck and Co. and Kmart. "You take a risk when you're out there, you're very exposed."

She noted that only 35% of small-business owners use social media. But it's a necessity, particularly the opportunities to bring in customers through "check-in" technology apps and QR codes.

For some retailers, particularly brick-and-mortar retailers, social media might be too daunting to take on by themselves. With the lower-than-expected holiday retail sales numbers (increasing just 3% to $579.8 billion, according to the NRF), it seems even more important that retailers do all they can to get customers in the door. (Online sales during November and December were predicted to rise 12%, but fell short, climbing 11.1%, according to Shop.org, NRF's digital division.)

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