This is Post 1 of 2. In Post 2 I’ll share ways to manage the Facebook firehose.
Being on Facebook and Twitter can sometimes feel like sticking your head into a gushing fire hydrant – overwhelming and far, far from pleasant.
Whenever I coach social media newbies, they are always taken aback by the sheer volume of stuff they get when they sign on to Facebook. From the never ending newsfeed to the barrage of friend requests, event invites and other notifications, the Facebook deluge makes them recoil and tune out.
Ditto for Twitter. Start following a decent number of people on Twitter, and reading every tweet becomes a Sisyphean exercise.
Some of this is just the nature of the beast. With hundreds of millions of people posting billions of pieces of content every day, there’s too much to keep up with. It’s like trying to be first on the expressway.
You need to control and filter your experience.
Get A Filtering Tool Like Hootsuite
One of my favorite ways to use Twitter is to listen and learn, but reading a high volume of tweets on www.twitter.com is a nightmare. Too much information.
Twitter became really useful to me when I got Hootsuite, which lets me make columns and tabs so that I can break up Twitter into smaller streams so that they are easier to digest.
There are lots of free tools that let you do this – Tweetdeck and Seesmic are two others. (Feel free to leave your favorite resource in comments.)
Once you have the right tool, you can make different kinds of filters to manage the flow of tweets.
Use Lists and Hashtags to Filter Twitter
The two things that helped me improve the signal-to-noise ratio are Twitter lists and hashtags.
Let’s start with lists. It’s recommended practice in some Twitter advice circles to follow all or most of the people who follow you, but the white noise this creates can drown valuable conversations and information.
Whichever follow philosophy you choose, there’s no rule that says you must read every tweet from everyone you follow.
Twitter lists are groups of people on Twitter. That’s it. You can make a list, or follow a list.
Use lists to keep tabs on colleagues, comedians, locals or luminaries. You don’t even have to follow a person to put them on a list. By default your list is public, but you have the option of making it private. You can follow any public list.
Twitter lists have added benefits – they let you give importance (you can get someone’s attention that way – say thanking donors or volunteers) and gauge importance (someone on a lot of lists has the admiration of peers).
My favorite and most useful personal Twitter lists include Nonprofits, Hudson Valleyish, Rhinebeck, Funny, Facebook, Food-Ag-Gardening. (Share your best Twitter lists in comments.)
Once you have a list you like (yours or someone else’s), then make a column for it in Hootsuite and enjoy a clearer stream.
Now on to hashtags. Instead of people, hashtags filter by subject. Wikipedia defines them thus:
Short messages on services such as Twitter, FriendFeed or identi.ca may be tagged by including one or more hashtags: words or phrases prefixed with a hash symbol (#), with multiple words concatenated, such as those in:
#RealAle is my favorite kind of #beer
Then, a person can search for the string #RealAle and this tagged word will appear in the search engine results. These hashtags also show up in a number of trending topics websites, including Twitter’s own front page.
My favorite hashtag is #nptech, which is nonprofit tech. It’s a well established, high quality and widely used tag, which makes it a great follow. Click here for a history of the #nptech tag (thanks to Beth Kanter for the link).
Once you find a tag that you want to follow, add a new stream to Hootsuite. Following an established tag like #nptech is a great way to get breaking news, meet and converse with people who share your interests and keep up with trends.
And that conference you’ve been dying to go to but couldn’t make it? Follow the conference’s hashtag – almost any conference worth its salt has a hashtag you can follow. The Nonprofit Technology Enterprise Network (NTEN) has done a great job the last few years promoting hashtags for its annual Nonprofit Technology Conference (see #ntc11). I’ve discovered new voices and gotten the skinny on conference presentations and blog posts.
As you refine your streams, you’ll get better at spotting common hashtags – give it some time.
Dip Into Your Streams As Needed
I don’t read every stream every day. Some I check once a week; others at least once or twice a day.
It will take time to refine your streams and lists. Some filters – like hashtags for conferences, events and campaigns – will cycle off your radar in time.
So get your tools, learn how to use them, and turn that firehose into your fountain of knowledge!
