Turn Your Notifications Off
The other day I did something radical. I decided to turn off all email notifications from Facebook. That probably doesn’t sound very radical, but I realized that every time I received an email from Facebook, I’d end up going onto Facebook and in the process waste a bit of time to answer a comment or check whatever else it was that brought me to Facebook. And when I looked at my other social networking accounts I saw similar distractions being sent that clogged my email.
As a business owner, I have to protect my time jealousy. If I don’t, I won’t get a lot done. It’s very easy to get caught up in social media sites, because someone answers a post you wrote or or some other conversation starts up. Notifications only make it more complicated, and are a reflection of a cultural push that we have to be notified of everything, or we’ll miss out on an opportunity or something else.
In Europe, companies are doing away with internal email. The argument is that email wastes time and decreases productivity. It’s an accurate perception of email, and notifications from social networking sites is also part of that information pollution.
The other day I got onto my Facebook account and under account settings, I turned off all the email notifications for my personal account. The only email notifications I left on pertained to my business pages, because I do want to offer a timely response. But I turned the rest off. I consciously chose to step back and let go of the need to be informed. I did the same with my Linkedin, Twitter, and Google Plus accounts.
And the result? Less email clutter, less distractions, more focus on what’s important. I check my Facebook once or twice a day and I can address the comments, likes, etc. Same for the other sites. Most importantly I’m not putting more time into social media than what needs to be there.
Turn your notifications off. You don’t need to be notified about every little thing on your social media accounts. Just go to the sites consistently and you’ll get the notifications you need to see when you visit the site.
Categories: Blog, Social Media, social media behavior
Tags: information pollution, lean business practices, social media behavior, social media marketing, Taylor Ellwood
