Chris Versace's  Instablog

Welcome to another edition of PowerTalk, where we bring you insightful conversations with key business people and other subject matter experts to bring you behind the scenes and in the know. As always the goal is to arm you with an informed perspective and data points that lead to better investing decisions.

Be it Facebook (FB) and its now sister property Instagram, LinkedIn (LNKD), Google+ (GOOG), Twitter, Path, Pinterest or any other one you can name, social media is changing a number of landscapes. How we communicate and interact with family, friends, co-workers, products and brands is all changing due to social media and it's making for some big business. Research firm BIA/Kelsey forecasts U.S. social media ad revenues to reach $9.2 billion in 2016, up from $4.6 billion in 2012 - that's a compound annual growth rate of 19.2%. Impressive but again that's just in the U.S and social media is part of a global shift in behavior that is a cornerstone of my Always On, Always Connected PowerTrend that subscribers to PowerTrend Profits hear about each and every month.

Joining me to talk about this is Patrick Sweeney, a serial entrepreneur, the President and CEO dwinQ - a social media product placement company. Patrick is also the author of RFID for Dummies and a frequent speaker on technology's impact on both business and life as well as how it creates value. Patricks's an extremely busy person so it was great to talk with him for as long as I did about as much as we did. We touched on a number of topics including the impact of social media and technology in brand building and how technology is helping companies like VAIL Resorts (MTN) and Disney (DIS) as well as brands like Heineken NV (HINKY) and Mondelez International's (MDLZ) Cadbury interact in new ways with their customers. Patrick also shares his perspective on a number of companies being impacted by social media - companies like Costco (COST) and Amazon.com (AMZN) as well as Facebook (FB) and talks on the multiplier benefit associated with sponsored events and social media marketing.

Like other PowerTalks, there's a wealth of useful information to be had in our conversation so let's get to it. Click here to listen.

Also incase you missed our last few PowerTalk interviews, you can access them here:

• Keith Bliss of NYSE Floor Firm Cuttone & Co.
• Jason Alderman of Visa (V)
• Gary Martin of General Motors (GM)
• CEO Interview with Gary Shapiro, President and CEO of the Consumer Electronics Association
• CEO Interview with James Debney, President and CEO of Smith & Wesson Holding Corp. (SWHC)
• Mobile Payments with Matt Jacobson of Acta Wireless