6 Social Media Resolutions for 2013

by: Danica Kombol

New Year’s Social Media Resolutions

On Christmas Eve, as we were decorating our tree, my kids moaned, “No more Instagramming.” Both my 20-year-old daughter and I were more fixated on creating artsy Instagram pics than we were adorning our tree. The next morning, my other daughter laid down the law, “No social media until after breakfast.” My husband piped in, “How about no social media all day.” I managed to make it through the day with only one brief visit to my Facebook page. If your teenage and twenty-something kids are begging you to lay off the social media sauce, it may be time for a few social media resolutions. Here are my 6 social media resolutions for 2013:

1. Social Media Diet: Put yourself on a social media diet. Three solid social media meals every day. By that I mean, check into your platforms three times a day – and no snacking in between. Pinterest (which in my house is like crack cocaine) is reserved for dessert.

2. Be in the moment: Recognize that not every moment is a social media moment. Special times with family, like decorating the tree, should be experienced in real time and the Instagram and Facebook photos kept out of the picture.

3. Be respectful: I’m pretty slap happy about posting pictures on Facebook but I always ask first. Randi Zuckerberg was rightly outraged when one of her friends tweeted out a private family holiday moment she had shared on Facebook. Ask before sharing – different people have different attitudes about what is public and private.

4. Set a goal: If you are using social media for business, set some goals. Create a clearly outlined goal for what you want to achieve through the use of social media and measure against those goals. Hint: Increasing your Facebook “likes” is not a goal. Building leads or building positive PR buzz is.

5. Spend Wisely: Yes social media is free, but think before you spend your tweets. Mindless content just to fill up your feed ends up annoying your followers and will never get you to a goal of building a community.

6. Be a good friend: Social media really is first and foremost about relationship building. It’s about sharing and being part of a community. Nobody likes a friend who is all about ME-ME-ME. Think sharing and building an alliance.

So let’s make a toast instead of a Tweet to our 2013 Social Media Resolutions Diet!