Apps
Managing Social Media Burnout
A reporter from CTV News came to Magnify Digital today to ask what advice we could offer to people with social media burnout. Turns out, managing time spent on these all-consuming networks is a popular new year’s resolution. You can see why it would be. The problem is there’s no on/off switch for social media. It’s always on. And we have more and more ways to connect to it. Through our computers, our phones, other handheld devices. Never before has social media been so prevalent and accessible.
Here are some tips on how you can reclaim some of your personal time:
- Limit the amount of time you spend on social networks. Even go as far as setting timers, to remind you when to step away.
- If you’re spreading yourself too thin trying to maintain multiple profiles across several networks, ditch one or two. Focus on fewer channels; maybe even just one.
- Consider dropping a friend or acqaintence if they’re too chatty and constantly require too much of your social time online. If that feels too harsh, then resist always giving him/her a response. You’ll train them to stop expecting it… and hopefully, asking for it too.
- On Facebook, turn off your chat function. That way, if you’ve limited yourself to ten minutes on Facebook, you won’t get caught using 8 of those 10 minutes on a chat. To find this function, look to the bottom right of your personal profile page. If the circle beside chat is green, you’re open for business. Simply click on this to open the chat function, select ‘options’ and ‘go offline’.
- If having a daily presence on social networks is important to you, use tools that can post your content for you. You can pre-schedule messages using tools like Hootsuite to populate your Twitter profile, Facebook, LinkedIn, and many others.
- Likewise, Ping.fm & Friendfeed are two examples of tools that give you the “one-stop-shop” option. If you want to post a message to Facebook, Twitter and MySpace all at the same time – these tools will do that for you.
- Even location-based tools like Foursquare and Gowalla can be managed simultaneously. Gowalla recently integrated Foursquare, Tumblr, and Facebook into its platform.
- If you’re feeling burnt out from too many messages on Twitter – also referred to as a congested stream – free tools like Tweetdeck allow you to organize who you’re following into columns (like friend tweets only, tech tweets, foodie tweets, etc.). That way, you can limit how much you see without having to drop friends or people you like to follow.
- And finally, this post would not be complete without mentioning mobile apps! These little gems can be a friend or foe when it comes to helping manage burnout. Apps can simplify access to social media – but perhaps too much. Limit your use of applications just as you would the social networks they’re enabling.
What do you do to manage a threat of burnout online?
Erin
Tags: Apps, burnout, chat, Erin, facebook, foursquare, friendfeed, gowalla, HootSuite, LinkedIn, ping.fm, time management, Tumblr, tweetdeck, Twitter
Love it or Hate it – The iPad
By now you have probably heard of a little something called… the iPad. Up until recently (May 28th to be exact) you weren’t able to buy it in Canada. But now you can.. and you should.
What’s so great about the iPad you ask? Is it really that sensational or is it just an oversized iTouch / iPhone?
The larger screen size does make it a more practical and comfortable experience when reading longer articles (eg. ebooks, pdfs, etc) or when using the multitude of Apps on the bright, crisp screen.
So what Apps are available? Apple has a featured selection and many other websites have a list of essential or top iPad Apps to download.
If you haven’t got your iPad yet, move fast and see if you can find one at the official Apple store or website. You might also find one at BestBuy, FutureShop or London Drugs. However, chances are you’ll have to wait a bit. With the 2 million iPads sold in less than 60 days since its initial release in the US, stock appears to be running low.
Do you have an iPad? How do you like it?
Victor
Tags: apple, Apps, Canada, ipad
