Patrick Crane, Vice President of Marketing at LinkedIn joined a panel of social media experts all the way from Silicon Valley via a live web link at the JCI Leeds annual business lecture. The event was sponsored by Leeds Business School and sought to unravel the mystery of the social networking world.

Steve Parks, a former BBC radio journalist, entrepreneur and member of JCI Leeds interviewed the panel which also included Dan Evans: Co-founder of V Social, Christine Morris: Founder of Apps and Hats, Will Kintish, leading networking and LinkedIn training authority.

Dan Evans opened the lecture with some astonishing statistics on social media, including the average age of Facebook and Twitter users, dispelling the myths that these platforms are just for kids.

Christine Morris spoke of the Smart-phone and how it is changing business as the internet is being accessed by ever smaller devices. As a massive fan of the iPhone since its launch three years ago she has set up an online review show of the some 200,000 apps now available, with a massive four billion downloads from the App Store so far.

Will Kintish, who claims to be the leading authority on business networking, lived up to the title by leading an engaging discussion on how LinkedIn can provide you with a valuable business tool but not forgetting the value of face-to-face contact when developing new business.

Patrick Crane is 'LinkedIn' with 900 people via his profile but you'll have to take his word for it unless you know him personally! This was one of his key messages about how LinkedIn can be used as an effective social networking tool and how it enables you to conduct business through trusted connections.

Claire Dempster, President of JCI Leeds, said: 'The lecture covered the importance of social networking for today's businesses and how companies should embrace it or risk being left behind.

'The event was a huge success and we received some fantastic feedback, one guest said it was the best JCI event they had ever been to!'