Friday, August 23, 2013

Likes, Upvotes, Views, Re-tweets and Shares - Social Media and You

Long, long ago, my fellow nerds boldly went where none had gone before.  The interwebs...

I know.  I know.  Nowadays everyone is on social media - all the time.  In order to maintain social cred, you must Facebook, Twitter, Blog, Reddit, Pinterest, VineTumblrInstagramGoogle+ and more!  There really aren't enough hours in the day to be as social as you have to be.


Not to mention more specialized sites - like GoodReads (for literate types), DeviantArt (for peeps who like pretty pictures) or YouTube (when you need moving pictures and sound)

It looks like the web, once the sole province of the socially disinterested and the technically elite (nerds), has been taken over by teens posting selfies, numerous cat videos, and the NSA (Hi Guys!).

So what's a nerd to do?

  1. Stop - just breath and realize you don't have be into everything.  You're a nerd remember.  It's ok to be really, really into your thing.  
  2. Find your community - believe me, whatever you're into, it's on the interweb (See Rule 34 - NSFW!).
  3. Sign up and lurk - watch forums and blogs.  Follow interesting people/topics.  You don't have to contribute
  4. Contribute - if you want, when you have something to say.  And try to be nice - we don't need more trolls!
    From Munchkin Card Game - Use with as much adult supervision as you can find
  5. Schedule - if you're running a blog or posting to some social media site and you want a ton of people watching/following you, schedule your posting times.  Around 6-7 Eastern is when most people are online, so you have the most chance of people seeing your stuff before it's lost in the shuffle if you schedule your uploads.

Does that make the interwebs a bit less scary?

Remember, my dear nerds, the interwebs is ours!  We had it first and we know it best.  Make it work for you.

What are your tips for surviving the social media jungle?

2 comments:

  1. I'm not quite nerdy enough. My niece asked me if I had a "Tumblr." I thought she was talking about a type of glass. No clue.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh, we can easily make you one of us!

      Besides, I don't use Tumblr or Pinterest either.

      Blogging and FB are about all I can handle and somedays, that's a stretch!

      Delete