How many of you made New Year resolutions? Congratulations! Now – how many of you have already broken them? Ah, our commiserations. Last year Cancer Research UK published a study to explore the significance of New Year’s resolutions, and found that out of the 4,000 adults polled in 2012, only nine per cent kept to their resolution for at least six months – while 39 per cent had already given up within the space of a fortnight.
While the majority of resolutions are usually health-related (such as losing weight or quitting smoking), unfortunately these tend to be the hardest to stick to – as people’s expectations are often misaligned with reality. However, there’s one resolution that could provide you with a multitude of benefits; and that is simply resolving to clean up your social media presence.
Face off with Facebook
With the social networking site constantly changing its privacy settings, it’s a good idea to see what information is visible to people outside your friends list. Got some questionable photos from the office party that you’d rather not be tagged in? Posted a dubious update when drunk? Additionally, it would also be a good idea to have a clear out of so-called ‘friends’.
Once seen as a huge status symbol by having hundreds of friends join your Facebook circle, it’s now becoming the norm to defriend mere acquaintances and only have genuine connections on your profile. As people become more selective about the information they publish, so they become more selective about the type of people they wish to be friends with online.
Filter your Twitter feed and followers
Akin to Facebook’s friends list, the feeling of self-importance from garnering a huge amount of followers can be rather overwhelming – but so can the amount of uninteresting tweets you may have posted during bouts of boredom. Take the New Year as an opportunity to tidy up your timeline, and see if the people you’re currently following are worth keeping on your feed – apps such as The Twit Cleaner or Friend or Follow will give you a helping hand in decluttering inactive/spammy tweeters as well as display those not following your updates.
For trending topics such as major sporting events or pop culture hashtags, keep a lid on it by utilising the Muuter app – this essentially mutes that horrendous TV show you can’t stand hearing about whilst allowing you to enjoy the other conversations flowing on the Twitter channel.
Better blogging
Not only is this great for personal development, but acts as a professional reference for prospective employers. Maybe you set one up a while back but became preoccupied with moving house/starting a new job, so now your distractions are out of the way it’s time to focus your energy in updating your online voice. Sites such as WordPress or Tumblr are great for those without coding experience, offering free templates to help get you started. Link it to your Twitter account for added exposure too, but remember to keep it regular – because if you begin to lose interest in blogging, then so will your readers.
So let’s kick off 2014 by practicing what we preach – and as we aim to be more much organised in the real world, so the same should apply to our online lives. Happy New ‘You’!
Post contributed by Rachael Pegram and Mariel Norton in collaboration with Lakestar McCann
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