Social Media Sins To Avoid In 2015

New Year, New YouTube

Blogger Yohana Desta has created a post over at Mashable detailing seven social media mistakes you've probably been making over the last year, and seven ways to stop making them. While resolutions such as drinking less alcohol or killing fewer puppies are made to be broken, these ones really should be followed if you're planning on improving your online presence in the next year.

source: alegoo.com

1. Use Twitter's ‘Mute’ Function More Freely

Following people on Twitter can be just as important for your reputation as getting them to follow you. If people notice you taking the time to express an interest in what they have to say, they'll think that you care about their thoughts just as much as you want them to care about yours.

At least, that’s how it can appear. Thankfully, you can now mute your more annoying Twitter contacts. This means that you'll appear to be following them, but your home page will remain streamlined and troll-free.

2. Make Sure Your LinkedIn Connections Know You 

LinkedIn is pretty damn good if you're after a job, looking after a job, or looking for someone to start doing a job you have to offer. Think of LinkedIn as a pool of like-minded professionals, all of whom use the site to hear the thoughts and opinions of people like you. If you're not sharing your content on LinkedIn, you're wasting a huge opportunity.

For tips on how to use LinkedIn like a pro user, check out our article on it here.

3. Regularly Chop And Change Your Mobile Apps

source: linkedin.com

This year, all the social networks seem to have gone even more mobile crazy. Even LinkedIn, which has always been seen as a PC only kind of deal, is close to achieving its ‘mobile moment’. With that in mind, it’s important to remain on top of all these changes. Flicking your updates to automatic is a great way to do this, but it can become confusing when you open up the Instagram app and suddenly can’t figure out how to add effects to that cute picture of your pug eating a homeless person. 

Alternatively, you may find these apps too distracting. If your newborn child is going hungry because you can’t drag your eyeballs away from your newsfeed, perhaps it’s time to uninstall a few apps. Or, at least, to turn auto sign-in off to make it more checking your feeds more time-consuming. Your kid - or your career, whatever your addiction is affecting, really - has gotta come first.

4. Cull Your Facebook List

Sorry, mum, we’re just not as close as we used to be. That's why it’s important to continuously update the list of people on your Facebook list - why would you want to see updates from people whose lives you don’t care about anymore? You connect with people on LinkedIn because you respect them professionally, you follow people on Twitter because you respect their opinion and you befriend people on Facebook because you shared a shot of tequila at a party once.

Which group has the least relevance to you as a professional? Consider why these people are still on your list; if you can't think of anything, it may be time to let them go.

5. There Are More Fun Things To Do In bed

source: blogs.constantcontact.com

Facebook is pretty addictive, as I attested to above. When you're waiting in traffic, you wanna see what your friends list is up to. When you're in a queue, you wanna do the same. When you're in bed, drifting peacefully to sleep, it will sometimes occur to you that you haven’t checked up on your flock of Facebook friends for a good two-and-a-half minutes. What do you do? 

Instead of reaching for your phone, remain disconnected. Networking from your mattress can lead to messed up sleeping patterns and a head full of bad statuses from the moment your alarm clock goes off. Use your sleepy time for sleep.

6. See What Other Networks Have To Offer

Ello might be crap. However, it might not be. You're at least slightly sick of Facebook, so why not try finding out for yourself how good or bad its underground alternatives are? 

If Ello is too mainstream for you, maybe you should check out something even more obscure like Beam Messenger or Blackberry Messenger. They’ll probably only keep their novelty for about a day, but at least they might make you appreciate Facebook, Instagram and Tumblr again.

7. Retract The Snapchat Claptrap

source: quickmeme.com

If you're anything like most human beings, you've spent way much free time posting absolute rubbish to your Snapchat story. You’ve probably been guilty of posting plenty of blurry, inaudible, drunken snippets for your followers to gawk over for up to 24 hours - then immediately regretted it the next morning.

Perhaps, this year, you can make up for your mistakes by thinking for a few seconds before sending such rubbish out. And if you’re into the whole ‘naked pictures’ thing (please add me on Facebook), maybe this year you should think twice about doing that as well.

Adapted from: source.

Emile Cole

Emile is a postgrad from the University of Saint Mark and Saint John. He’s hoping to break into journalism or publishing, and won’t stop blogging until he’s managed it! Follow him @EmileAtSMF.

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