A survey by the Internet and Mobile Association of India found that 78 million netizens across the country were active users of Facebook in early 2013, registering a 50 percent growth over the same period in 2012, followed by 33 million users on Twitter and 20 million users on LinkedIn.

Asserting that social media was the next big frontier, institute group director Uday Salunkhe said whether people like it or not, they could not ignore the powerful medium in the virtual world.

"The boom has established social media as an imperative part of a holistic marketing strategy as it proved to be hugely beneficial for businesses to reduce costs, improve customer services and create an online personality," Salunkhe told about 200 participants from management and marketing fields.

Executives from corporate world and research experts from B-schools across the country spoke on the best practices they adopted to use social media for promoting and marketing products and services in the virtual world.

Among the noted speakers at the conference included LinkedIn India head Nishanth Rao, US-based Emory University marketing and strategy professor Jagdish N. Sheth, Portea Medical founder K. Ganesh and Social Wavelength founder Sanjay Mehta.