Having spent three months on Facebook, Darwin the Monkey, Develop-meant Training Consultant's company mascot, made a controversial decision back in August to shun the Social Media site and focus all his attention on his "Banana Blog". ADRIAN PITT investigates the reason behind the move and wonders whether Darwin is putting all his bananas in one basket...

Friday 13th is supposed to be a day of strange goings on. Folk avoid walking under ladders, only to stumble into gutters to get splashed by passing lorries. Family members make an extra effort to salute magpies, to the point that passers-by think your crazy clan have Tourette's Syndrome! Darwin the Monkey, Develop-meant Training Consultant's mascot, waved a far-from-fond farewell to Facebook on Friday 13th August. His decision may seem a little odd, given that Social Media popularity is on the rise and more and more businesses are using two or more sites to promote what they do. "Facebook just wasn't bending my banana business-wise," Darwin claims. "I was putting in a huge amount of effort just to entertain friends and family on the whole."

The jury's still out as to whether Facebook is a "just for fun" site. Darwin continues: "Initially, when I first set the page up, there was a reasonable amount of interest. I was looking to be "christened" and there was £50 on offer to the Facebooker who could come up with a moniker for me. However, if you look at the statistics: out of 250 Friends, only around 100 signed up, even though everyone was sent a message to their Inbox along with a link to the page." Darwin says: "The 27 or so other Fans came from the likes of Twitter and Linked-in, people we were in touch with anyway and knew exactly what we did."

The big question is, what was Darwin hoping to achieve from Facebook? "I suppose it was another avenue to help increase awareness of our "brand" and what we do," he says. "However, on reflection, everyone who did sign up to our page knew that anyway!" So, as "marketing monkey" what has Darwin learnt from his time on Facebook? "I'm not sure Facebookers are that interested in what business folk have to say. Facebook is a place where they post comments about their insomnia, the weather, how naughty their new-born baby is and where they're going on their holidays. I understand not everyone's on Twitter, or Linkedin etc., so, you could say that Facebook reaches out to your contacts who haven't signed up to these sites. However, if those same contacts are interested in business and what business folk have to say, then, why haven't they put their names down already?!"

I posed the following to our marvellous monkey. "Let's say I run a self-tanning business, or I'm an expert in holistic treatments, don't you think my Facebook contacts would want to know about my latest offers?" "I think you've hit the nail on the head there, Ade, to be fair. Activities such as the ones you've mentioned would appeal to some of my friends and family and that's where I think Social Media maniacs need to really think about targeting what they do. They shouldn't be spreading themselves too thinly. For Develop-meant Training Consultants, I've had much more interest and much more "reward" both personally and professionally (hot on the heels of my Facebook experience) by determining which sites are the best for the business - Linkedin and Training Zone have come out tops."

So was Facebook a faux pas? "Not really," says our perky primate, "You have to try these things out. Curiosity got the better of me. Fortunately, it kills cats not monkeys!"

Darwin and Ade ponder life every so often on Darwin's "Banana Blog". To visit and subscribe click here Banana Blog