When I couldn’t get a cab two weeks ago after walking out of Grand Central Terminal, I asked the first car that finally stopped for me about an hour later what was going on and his two word response said it all: Fashion Week. Taking place from September 5 - 13^th, 2012 New York’s Fashion Week brings together the biggest designers in the popular industry with those that are up and coming for some amazing fashion shows and even crazier parties.

This year, the fashion industry and the wild world of social media overlapped and as we speak London’s Fashion Week is now underway, resulting is videos from the invite only events being streamed live to the world along with tweeting and blogging being powered by designers, editors and celebrities alike.

Reuters revealed that retail clothing chain Topshop is claiming that over 200 million people analyzed images and content that were ripped right from the runway, all of which fell in line with the newly inked relationship Topshop now has with Facebook (News - Alert). An extremely interesting thing to note is the fact that the company saw massive results from allowing spectators to leverage social media and then buy the looks they loved and first were introduced to on the catwalk. A dress that was the first outfit shown during the show sold out even before the curtain went down. Pretty impressive, huh?

"People have been trying to figure out for some time, how do you make these 'likes' into something relevant, how does the social aspect mix with your brand, and I think we are going to be the first brand to unlock that, we're going to be the case study...(to) commercialize that social audience," Justin Cooke, Topshop's chief marketing officer, said in a statement.

House of Holland also jumped on the social networking train, collaborating with online bidding site eBay (News - Alert) and designer Alice Temperley where she displayed some of her most exquisite work via "online runways".

"The traffic to the website kind of peaks when you tweet with Pinterest, Instagram," Temperley commented. "It's just full-time work for a whole team of people, but it's the way things are going."

In addition to showing those not so lucky fashionistas who couldn’t actually be on the sidelines at the shows the new “in” accessories for the upcoming seasons, social media is also providing the public with a forum of sorts where they can discuss things they are viewing that they love, hate and wish they could afford.

According to Lucy Yeomans, editor-in-chief of fashion retail site Net-A-Porter.com and former editor of UK's Harper's Bazaar, "I think anyone who doesn't tap into the power of social media is just missing a massive trick; it's not just a marketing tool."

As the use of social media grows by the minute, you can be sure that many more industries will benefit from the saturation of these sites.

Want to learn more about the latest in communications and technology? Then be sure to attend ITEXPO West 2012, taking place Oct. 2-5, in Austin, TX. Stay in touch with everything happening at ITEXPO (News - Alert). Follow us on Twitter.