Social marketing software provider Spredfast announced on Tuesday that it has raised $18 million in venture capital, ending what has been a banner year for the company and starting off 2013 strong.

In 2012, the company reportedly doubled the number of its employees, and saw 400 percent revenue growth. So the money is well invested.

Investors include the OpenView Venture Partners, Austin Ventures and InterWest Partners, with OpenView leading, and the others already established investors in the company.

Spredfast will be using the $18 million to continue growing its team, primarily to increase adoption of its technology and social marketing platform for 2013.

OpenView’s managing director Adam Marcus commented on his company’s investment; “We believe Spredfast has built the only true enterprise-class product to help the Fortune 1000 manage this incredibly important channel. We couldn’t be happier to partner with this tremendous team to build a category-defining company.”

Spredfast’s platform is based on growing trends in social media that have been developed over the past few years. Companies are seeing social media take over the market increasingly, and to the extent that major shifts in adoption and revenue can be made based on one small change in the social media sphere.

Not leveraging this powerful determiner is almost impossible these days, for successful companies that is.

“Social is rapidly becoming the preferred interaction mechanism for consumers and business people alike,” explained Rod Favaron, Spredfast CEO. “The time is fast approaching when your customers will no longer email or call you – they will send out a signal via social and expect a thoughtful response. They’ll expect you to know about them and for you to offer them something of value for their attention.”

If this seems like a strange idea now, Spredfast warns that it will not seem so strange in the next few years, and the time to take advantage of the company’s platform is now.

“Spredfast’s customers understand the strategic advantage of laying the technical and organizational foundation for this future now, working with a trusted partner whose entire focus is social,” Favaron added.

Marcus describes the market as being “at an inflection point,” as the power of social media has already been established, but the best way to leverage this power is still up for debate.

“Companies are no longer concerned with Likes,” said Marcus, hinting at the criticism Facebook (News - Alert) has drawn for the reported meaninglessness of this feature, “but rather with building real customer engagement and value across their social networks.”

According to Spredfast’s Social Engagement Index, the average large company has about 100 social accounts, spanning across 21 or so groups. Spredfast is offering a unique platform that allows companies with this kind of widespread social footprint to operate every account in a cohesive and consistent manner.

For more information on Spredfast’s offerings, visit www.spredfast.com.