Twitterstop

Help! I’m addicted to Social Networking!

Posted on 25. Feb, 2009 by admin in NetworkingTips, Social Networking, Tips

The alarm goes off and you’re woken up to Chris Brown telling you that “he needs you boo” (forgot to set the radio to a better station). You get up, take care of business at the toilet, and grab a little something to drink. Before you even hit the bathroom though, you already had your cell phone in hand, scrolling through Twitterrific and checking emails. Thirty minutes later you realize that you need to jump in the shower and get ready for work. Too much time was already eaten up checking Twitter, responding to tweets, checking Facebook, 2 myspace accounts, several email accounts, voicemails, and chatting with the friend that caught you at your computer through ichat.

With so much social networking consuming our lives and vying for our time, how do we get any work done? What do the guys/girls who have over 10,000 followers do for a living? (you’ve asked yourself that question before, haven’t you?) How do they have so much time for Twitter, and posting tweets every 30 seconds? I barely have enough time to keep up with 150 followers. Social networking is great, and compliments our businesses, organization, causes, ministries, and simply our social lives, but it sure can eat up a lot of time if we’re not careful.

As a small business owner and designer that spends a lot of time behind a computer, I’ve experienced first hand how keeping up with the social networking joneses can steal valuable work hours. I’ve developed a good balance though, and of course at times, you simply have to shut it all down. With that said, I thought I’d provide a few helpful tips or methods that will help you balance your social networking addiction and the work that pays the bills. Put these into action, and your life will become a beautiful, ninja style balance.

1. Not Social networking will not kill you - if you’re like most networkers and Twitter users, you can easily get trapped into the Twitter Game. You want to stay connected and be a valuable Twitter resource, so you feel that you have to keep a certain frequency within the “matrix”. If you don’t tweet enough or retweet throughout the day, you can begin to feel disconnected. Well, Twitter will survive without you and it’ll still be there in the morning or when you log back in at night. Remember, don’t hate the playa, hate the game.

2. Watch the clock - set a time limit for yourself in the mornings or when you normally get your day started. I’ll usually reserve first thing in the morning to checking emails, going through social networking sites (i.e. facebook, myspace, twitter, etc.) to see what’s going on. I set a time limit though, so that I don’t find myself doing this for 2 hours. The plan of course is to randomly stay connected throughout the day.

3. Use a good Social Networking client - there are so many tools available that allow users to consolidate all of their social networking tools into one application. I won’t list all of those yet, but we’ll use Twitter as an example. I have two Twitter accounts, one personal one and the other is for Twitterstop.com. The twitter deck for me has been Twhirl, because it allows me to handle multiple accounts at the same time. I usually have those two accounts open to the right of my 24″ screen, and simply monitor it through out my work day.

What’s cool about Twhirl is that as new tweets come in, they show up in little preview boxes for a second or two, which allows me to quickly scan through them to see if they’re anything of interest or deserving of a retweet. You’re alerted as well by a sound, which drives my wife crazy sometimes, as I have a habit of leaving my speaker volume high. Sometimes in the middle of the night, we hear all these beeps coming from the other room.

The other available tool for Twitter is tweet deck, which offers tons of great features as well. They just don’t offer the management of multiple accounts.

4. Simply Unplug - On a regular basis, the only solution to being able to get work done and not be distracted by social networking, is to just turn it all off. I know, you didn’t want to hear that, but desperate times call for desperate measures (is that a line from a movie? where did I hear that before?) Anyway, your only solution at times will be to simply unplug yourself from the networking world. Turn it all off, close your twitter window or client, and get some work done. Put on some music to get your mind off of twitter, and get your butt to work. Set some goals to complete before coming back to the “matrix”.

What’s funny is that this whole article sounds like a counseling session to help someone addicted to crack or something similar. Twitter is the new crack I guess. Just won’t kill you. Or maybe it will. Who knows?

Thanks for stopping by. Hope these short tips help you out. Let us know your thoughts.

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