how to create a better social media experience

There’s a conversation that’s been going on around the web for the last couple of weeks: digital clutter. I have really enjoyed chatting both on Twitter and through the Letter about how messy social media and our inboxes have become because of digital clutter: people trying to make us read things, buy things, or just know things.

One thing that I mentioned to one of the Letter subscribers is that by cleaning out who you’re following and simplifying your will help enhance the experience of social media for yourself, obviously. It’ll also help you rethink your own social media strategy so that you’re creating a better experience for your followers as well.

Because I really want to keep the conversation going on simplifying, decluttering, and getting back to what social media is all about, I wanted to share some tips on how to create a better social media experience for yourself and your followers today –

For Yourself

If you feel yourself getting tired of your social media feed, don’t worry – you’re not alone. A lot of people are feeling frustrated with their Twitter feed, in particular, but most social media outlets are also getting incredibly cluttered as well. Here are a few ways you can clean things up and create a better experience for yourself:

Audit who you’re following. Let’s be real with each other: our problems with social media usually start with who we’re following. If you’re green with envy every day, frustrated by someone’s consistent negative attitude, or just overwhelmed with the link sharing, it’s time to start changing who you’re following. A lot of people don’t like unfollowing because it tends to make people feel like you don’t like them anymore but remember: this is your experience with social media. If you want to continue feeling frustrated with the platform, keep those people around. Otherwise: clean up your list.

Create lists to keep up with certain people. One thing I never really did until sometime within this past year was to create and utilize lists on Twitter. I follow a wide variety of people over there: bloggers, business owners, designers, developers, people who just help business owners, and so on! It’s much easier to find someone when I’m looking for a specific type of person or to connect with certain people through the lists. It’s also a great way to find new links from my fellow bloggers when I’m looking to find new blogs to check out or more posts to share with my followers.

For Your Followers

As I mentioned before, if you’re feeling frustrated with your social media you’re certainly not alone. It’s likely that you and your followers are in the same community, seeing the same things, and your followers are equally as frustrated with what’s showing up in their feed. The good news is that you can help create a better experience for your followers as well. Here’s how:

Audit your own sharing strategy. The easiest place to start is to audit your own strategy. If you’re not digging so many links being shared, then maybe you should slow down sharing so many links (and thus adding to the chaos). If you find yourself envious of someone else, maybe you share more realistic posts with your followers so they see both sides of life doing what you do. If you think there are too many advice posts online, maybe you share more personal posts to get the conversation back on the doers of the web. It’s totally okay to feel frustrated with the way social media is going, but you have to do something to help change it if so.

Ask questions and respond to people. Another super easy way to change how people experience following you on social media is to put the focus back on connecting with your readers / followers rather than growing your numbers. It literally kills me to see so many posts online about how to grow your readers, followers, and subscribers fast because here’s the thing: when you do that, you’re likely not interacting with who’s joining your community. You’re not connecting with them or figuring out why they like what you’re doing or how you can help them. Instead of just growing your numbers blindly, remember to post real things online like silly thoughts or questions. Respond to something someone has posted. Don’t just link share: start a conversation.

There’s so much digital clutter on social media. At the end of the day, you can create a better experience for yourself and your followers by being more intentional with who you’re following and what you’re posting. Regardless of how you’re feeling about how cluttered the online world is lately, I’m challenging myself and all of my followers to engage their readers and interact with who they’re following equally or more than you’re sharing links and promoting yourself.