Wednesday 30 June was, according to Mashable, World Social Media Day, a day for social networkers to meet up in real life and celebrate their addiction to tweets, connections, ‘likes’, comments and status updates – which makes now a perfect time for news revealing just why people love social media so much.

It’s because we’re all getting high off ‘cuddle drug’ oxytocin, according to research by neuroeconomist Paul Zak. Every time we tweet, make a new connection or get a reply to a status update, we get a little rush of the natural ‘love drug’, the same one that bonds mothers to their babies, lovers to one another and social media fiends to their Crackberrys.

On the big scale, as this article in Fast Company magazine reveals, Paul Zak’s work in ‘neuroeconomics’ is about measuring how human biology affects our spending habits, and his findings that positive hormones like oxytocin inspire higher levels of trust, and hence more willingness to engage in financial transactions, have caused quite the sensation.

It seems social media users’ brains do not differentiate between the buzz of interaction with friends in real life and the buzz of interaction online, which is good news for brands who want to form long-lasting, intimate, monogamous relationships with their customers.

At Lingo24, we’ve found that professional networking sites like LinkedIn and Xing are an important driver of business. By networking online we’re able to find people who can benefit from our services, and by interacting regularly we can get a bit of banter going and make friends with our customers, so when they think about needing a translation their first thought is for Lingo24.

We’ve also found it’s a lot easier now to get potential clients involved in social media – five years ago convincing people to join up and follow you on a social network was no easy task, but after the organic explosion of Facebook, just about everyone is familiar with social networking and its potential uses, so bringing the business element into the mix is a natural progression. Not only that, but we’ve found that internal social networks like Yammer help to keep everyone in the team connected and communicating, no matter where they are around the world.

Indeed, the naysayers who see social media as a massive waste of time are just lacking love juice, because all that time we spend posting in social network interest groups, tweeting to our followers and chatting with clients over instant messaging isn’t wasted at all – it’s raising our clients’ oxytocin levels, as well as ours, and helping to strengthen those warm and fuzzy feelings that come with great service.

So there you go – short of forcibly injecting your customers with love hormones to make them more receptive and generous, the best way to raise your customers’ trust levels is to simply connect with them online and engage in some old fashioned business banter. Who would’ve guessed that happiness is a warm tweet?