The economic downturn has created all sorts of business pressures.  A recent survey of B2B marketing trends has shown that, with increased pressure on budgets, more and more companies are accelerating their use of new media over more costly traditional channels.  With company websites and email marketing approaching saturation levels in terms of usage, attention is now shifting to interactive/social media.

However not every company can launch a blog or create a Facebook page and nor should they. Even if your company doesn't have the resources for a dedicated social media strategy, here are five social media sites and tools you can't afford to ignore.

1. Twitter

First it was MySpace, then YouTube, then Facebook, now Twitter is the "hot" social site that everyone is buzzing about. Twitter can be a difficult tool to explain if you've never used it. Think of it as being similar to IM (instant messaging), but instead of talking to just one person you can talk to many people at once. It is similar to IM in functionality, but also has elements of a chat room, albeit with more control over whose messages you see.

Why you should pay attention: Twitter enables your customers to leave almost real-time communication. Think of Twitter as "Word of mouth on steroids." It is an excellent tool for facilitating real-time communication and letting people share ideas and collaborate. This can be good, or bad, for your company.

What you should do NOW: Start monitoring Twitter just as you are monitoring blog mentions about your company and your industry. Start watching how your customers are using Twitter to interact with each other and what they are discussing. Unhappy customers now have a very real medium for their complaints.   

2. Google Sidewiki

Sidewiki is a just-launched add-on for the Internet Explorer (version 6 plus) and Firefox (version 2 plus) browsers that lets you comment on or leave information associated with any Web page. Basically, it makes every website social - even your website. If people don't like the customer service you provided, they can leave a comment directly on your homepage stating so. Likewise, if you gave them excellent customer service, they can say that as well. Furthermore after you add a comment, you can then share it via link, email, Twitter, or Facebook.

As this tool is new, there will no doubt be many tools and applications created shortly that play off of the functionality of Sidewiki. Needless to say, this add-on holds powerful implications for any company that creates online content.

Why you should pay attention: Every webpage can now be commented on - every, single one. Potentially, your competitor could comment on your company's website criticising your products and services. So can your customers. Did you launch a blog but not permit comments? Now your readers can still comment "on" your blog.

What you should do NOW:  Start by going add Google Sidewiki to your browser. Then check out your website, your blog, and social sites that you have a profile page on to see whether anyone has commented on any of those pages. 

Going forward you will have to start thinking about how to respond to customers online, because this tool has the potential of becoming very popular. Remember when you heard that "you can't control the conversation"? That's now become reality with tools like Sidewiki.

3. Facebook

A social-media strategy does not begin and end with launching a page on Facebook. However Facebook's rapidly growing user base (now over 300 million members) makes it impossible to ignore.

Why you should pay attention: Facebook offers members the ability to create their social profile, and companies the ability to create pages. Members can also create groups based on certain topics, causes, or interests. For many people, especially those under age 40, Facebook is their primary social site. It also appears as if Facebook is trying to position itself as the one place to go for all social media needs. The site recently acquired social-sharing site FriendFeed and later attempted to buy Twitter.  Your company may not need to be active on Facebook but you need to be aware of what they offer.

What you should do NOW:  Become familiar with the Facebook environment. Join the site and create a profile just for yourself or for your business as well. Spend some time checking out its features. Make a special effort to see whether any of your direct competitors are active on Facebook, and also check for any industry-specific groups that have been created. You want to see whether your customers are already active on Facebook and if it would be worthwhile for your company to create a place where they could connect with you, and you with them. As with anything else in social media, be curious.

4. Google Reader

If you subscribe to blogs, message boards, or other sites that offer a feed of their content, Google Reader is the feed reader that you should seriously consider using. By simply subscribing to searches related to your company and industry, it allows you to create a very effective (and free) monitoring system for your business.

Why you should pay attention: Google Reader is not merely a robust feed reader; it also has several social elements built in. You can share any item/article/post that comes through Google Reader with anyone who is following you. You can also choose to share that item/article/post on most of the popular social sites, such as Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, FriendFeed, etc.

What you should do NOW: If you are already using another feed reader, give Google Reader a try. The social elements incorporated into Google Reader differentiate it. It's a great way to understand how the content you create, and read, is resonating with others. 

5. FeedBurner

FeedBurner is the dominant feed-management service. If your company has a blog, or if you have a personal blog, FeedBurner is a site that you must use. 

Why you should pay attention: FeedBurner allows you to distribute, manage, and track your blog's or site's feed. It will also help you promote it and add sharing functionality. It will even give you the ability to let readers email you directly from the feed. It's a wonderful tool for tracking the popularity of the content you create and for drilling down to see which content is getting clicked on more than others.

Why you should do NOW: Create a FeedBurner account and burn a feed for your blog using FeedBurner. You do need a Google account but since you've already created one for using Sidewiki and Google Reader, that's no problem.  After you have created the FeedBurner account, start paying attention to the statistics related to your feed, especially your number of subscribers and how that tracks over time. You could also add an email subscription option—FeedBurner provides you the code for adding it to your blog—and track that as well.