You can’t deny that online social networking is the rage right now. In fact, it’s been the rage for so long, it’s probably peaked. Every day, I feel like I read another post about the need for a shared data pool or at least an aggregate site that can keep all of the various social networking sites’ information in one neat and tidy place. Go ahead and have a MySpace, Facebook, Xanga, and LinkedIn. The suggestions are that they all share the same data from a database that you manage, or they all provide API’s to third party pepes so that they can make software that lets you manage them all in one place. Sounds great, right?
Maybe that’s the way to go. Or maybe it’s actually good to maintain multiple presences on multiple social networking circles. Who knows. What I do know is that social networking isn’t going anywhere, and it’s just as important to our generation as Woodstock was to our parents (and grandparents for some of you…weird) But I’m going to offer some tips that may help you circumnavigate the ever-growing time sucker that is social networking:
- Don’t be obsessed. Harder than it sounds, huh? Or maybe you think that sounds ridiculously simple. Both of those statements are true, my Friends. Both are true. It’s very easy to become obsessed with checking your MySpace or Facebook multiple times a day to see if you have any messages or if someone else has joined your list of bestest of online friends. Don’t fall into the trap! The first step to recovery is admit you have a problem then force yourself to keep a healthy perspective and maintain a good balance of how you spend your time online. Better yet, also maintain a good balance of online/offline time. Remember: the original social networking involved shaking hands, hugs, laughing together over coffee, and hearing a human voice. The funny thing is, though not as popular, it’s still just as effective today at maintaining relationships. A simple way to do this? Set goals you want to accomplish in the real world as well as online. Goals like “Read four books a month.” or “Have lunch with three people this week.” Or maybe “Research one completely new and random topic on Wikipedia each day.” These will add value to your time and help prevent you from becoming a MySpace zombie.
- Stick to a ritual. Decide on a schedule for checking your social networking sites and stick to it. My recommendation is once per day, but if you make your living online by utilizing these tools, more often may be necessary. Regardless of your frequency needs, the point is to be at least semi-systematic about it. For me, I set my various sites to notify me of messages and other events, then I apply filters in my mail app to sort out the important notifications. Do I need to know EVERY TIME Joey Blogsalot posts a new story about how he burnt his lap on the way back from Starbucks today? No. As amused as I am by Joey’s blog (otherwise I wouldn’t read it), getting notified 27 times a day about his latest antics will only suck the productivity right out of my time.
- Compartmentalize your different profiles. LinkedIn is targeted to a more professional crowd. Xanga focuses on bloggers and MySpace is more about fun. At least that’s how I utilize them. Find a reason to be on each site and be that person in that web circle. Using each site for a purpose will give you incentive to narrow down your profiles to what you actually use and will help you be deliberate about maintaining them.
- Link to your other profiles when appropriate. I probably wouldn’t link to my MySpace profile from LinkedIn, but I may link the other way around. Facebook is probably my middle ground, so I link to each of my profiles there. I also link to all of my profiles on the notbadbutgood blog about page. Basically, linking to each of your profiles from the others puts some of your networking on autopilot. Which brings me to my next tip…
- Set it, and forget it. Don’t spend hours each day looking for a different layout or leaving countless comments on people’s pages. You should establish a look you like, a feel you like, and then randomly comment or message people during your social networking rituals. If you link to your other sites, provide all the necessary information on your profile, and use my tip about having the sites send notifications to you, you can more or less forget that you have your profiles when you are focused on other things like work, school, or cribbage. Periodically making adjustments and spending time making the virtual rounds is fine…just not every hour of every day.
- Be yourself. There is this temptation online to put forth an ideal front. Or maybe even a completely different version of you. This isn’t really all that harmless. For one, it will possibly give you a skewed version of yourself in your own mind, or the more obvious possibility of giving someone else a skewed view of who you are. I’m all for being the “music fan” you on one, the “professional you” on another, and the “cynical you” on yet another. Everyone has different facets of their personality, but I would recommend two things: One, never misrepresent yourself; you never know which relationships will one day be realized in meatspace. Two, even though you may focus on one aspect of yourself in a particular network (which I’ve already said is healthy and good), make sure that you include at least hints of the rest of your wonderful aspects as well. It will make you more interesting online and will also keep you honest about how you present yourself to your virtual pepes.
So far, we haven’t garnered a large number of commenters here at notbadbutgood, but to those of you who do, keep them coming! What tips do some of you have? Do you use multiple social networking sites? If so, how do you manage them or use them to your advantage?