Are you overloaded by Social Media?
Social media is fun. Social media is a great way to connect with other like minded people. Social media is a great way to interact with potential clients and customers for your business. But what are you supposed to do when social media becomes too time consuming and wraps up the vast majority of your time and you’ve been sucked into the black hole and cannot seem to get out long enough to keep your business floating? “Social Media Experts” and others will tell you that you need to get with the latest and greatest. Being everywhere at all times is time-consuming. So to help you avoid suffering from overload, here are a few “affirmations” that will help you focus your efforts and help you decide what sites you will jump in on, or pass up.
Social Media is a great TOOL for business – not the business itself
Currently, social media is something most businesses need to spend some time to focusing on in order to leverage it correctly, but while this is important you should also remember that a company is not solely built off social media. Balance. Balance. Balance. Social media is a great way to connect with potential clients and interact with people who can become part of your tribe and help broadcast your business to even more people. But social media is not the entire business, as you may have rudely found out. Finding balance is the key to a happy relationship in your home, at your job or with yourself. Finding that balance can be a bit harder than it sounds though.
Limiting your social media time
I know some people who spend 3-4 hours tweeting each day, while others only tweet for an hour or so while they’re stumbling and looking for other interesting links to read. Still some are on Facebook multiple times throughout the day, and it adds up. Set a limit of the time you spend on social media for the rest of August. Perhaps start with 1.5 hours a day; 45 in the morning and 45 when you wrap up your day.
Life will go on
Look, I know it’s tempting to sweat all of your Twitter followers or your Facebook Friends for a Google+ invite. The numbers of kool-aid drinkers sign-ups they have achieved in their first month are greater than what it took Twitter and Facebook years to accomplish. Plus, (pun intended) Google+ is still technically a “field test” meaning that Google is merely trying stuff out and seeing what sticks. So, the allure of trying to get in is…alluring. But if you never get an invite, or fail to completely adopt Google+ it will not be the end of the world. The same information being shared on Google+ is the same information that can be found on Twitter, Facebook, Digg, Reddit, Tagged, and every other site you can think of. It will just be arranged differently. So relax, if you never jump on Google+, it’s not that deep.
Go with what you know
Which leads me to my next point: If you are a Tweeting God, or have fifty thousand Facebook friends, or already schooling folks on how you think Google+ is doing the most, and you feel informed, engaged, productive and just plain ol’ comfortable using those sites, work those and forget the rest. Spreading yourself too thin by trying to be involved in every conversation on every site is not a good look. So relax, you will miss something on your go-to platform if you are trying to be the King/Queen of all Social Media…It’s not that deep.
There will ALWAYS be something new
Tomorrow will come and the next new social networking site is currently being brainstormed in college dorms, incubated at start-up accelerators, pitched to venture capitalists and angel funds, and being spread around by PR Firms. So if you’re glad you’ve missed out on the insane amount of tweets that currently flood your average Twitter timeline, or can’t stand all of your family members answering “Questions” about you, your ideal social networking platform is coming. You may have to tune out all the noise that comes with people swearing by their weapon of choice. So relax, the “new hotness” will arrive. So right now, it’s just not THAT deep.
Anyone else have an issue with social media? Please share with us.
