Last night after reading Noah Kagan’s post about how there is no money in social networking I began seriously thinking about the issue. If there is no money in social networking, why am I investing so much time reading and writing about it? Ultimately, where is the real money to be made out of this? The end result is what I keep coming up with time and time again: personal branding.

If you are looking to make money off of Facebook applications or your own social network, odds are not in your favor. On Facebook for instance, only the top 100 companies at the most are generating substantial revenue from social networks. The rest are scrambling to figure out a way to make money or spending somebody else’s hard earned cash. The largest value to be gained from social networking and social media is building social equity.

Somebody will soon figure out an effective way to monetize relationships (most likely Facebook) but for the most part it will be extremely challenging. As such, I’d suggest leveraging these new technologies to build brand you. I know I posted this yesterday but as I think more about whether these technologies can currently be effectively monetized, the reality is no. It is the brands that end up generating the revenue. So what are you doing to build brand you?