For better or for worse, social media is a major part of our modern society. It brings people together, but it can also be a major distraction and many of us have major pet peeves when it comes to the industry as a whole. Here are a few simple tricks to help streamline your social media experience to make it more enjoyable, and less frustrating.
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Manage Your Notifications: Notifications are great…sometimes. They let you know when someone is trying to get ahold of you, but they’ll often alert you unnecessarily (for instance, when someone you know posts for the first time in a while. Who cares?!). Make sure you only get the notifications you want by going into the “notification settings” on both your social media’s websites and on their mobile app. This will ultimately eliminate unwanted disturbances and make sure you only get the notifications you need! If you have an iPhone, you can also turn on "Do Not Disturb" if you don't want notifications in a meeting or during your afternoon nap.
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Delete Unused Apps: Be honest with yourself, are you ever going to log back into that Myspace account? If the answer is “no,” then the app shouldn’t be taking up precious space on your phone! Deleting old or unused social media apps is a great way to clear up space on your phone as well as a way to make sure you’re only focused on the social media you actually care about.
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Streamline your Friends: If your feed is getting gummed up with photos of people you haven’t seen in over a decade, or your friend count is in the quintuple digits, it may be time to streamline your list of friends. Getting your friend count down is a good way to only see posts from people you actually care about, and most people won’t even notice they’ve been unfriended. No hard feelings here, just a simple way to make your feed more enjoyable. Sorry guy-from-the-bar-who-I-spoke-to-once!
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Unfollow People: This is perhaps the friendlier alternative to unfriending people. Unfollow anyone who’s posts you don’t really want to see. This works like a charm on Facebook where you can unfollow people without unfriending them. You are still technically friends, so they won’t one day see you’ve unfriended them, but you won’t see their posts anymore. Similar techniques can be applied to Twitter, Instagram, etc.
- Beware of Following Bots: For those who don’t know, bots are automated social media accounts that post, like, follow, etc. automatically. Generally, they are full of spam posts or advertisements that no one wants to see. If you keep seeing posts by some app or company you’ve never heard of, check to make sure you didn’t accidentally follow a bot account.
