Social media generate and distribute tons of content every day, but the number of different platforms, networks, apps, and messengers makes this content extremely hard to watch, categorize, and process. Advertisement and search algorithms live their own lives, proposing to us the news they think we’d like. But how can we sail in this vast ocean of information not losing track? Let’s see what the tips of staying in touch with the world and not losing ourselves in the social media news are!
Good old searching
It is a kind of old-fashioned way to get the news by just ignoring your feed and going straight to the search panel. Enter keywords and read the search results. This will spare you lots of time that otherwise you’d spend scrolling through personal stories and advertisements. It isn’t as intuitive and easy as watching your feed directly, but getting the news you really want to see is worth a few clicks.
Moreover, this is how to teach the search algorithms and train them to show you the news of your real interest. If you are new to social media, the algorithm will simply show you the most popular posts, “watching” as you like (or don’t like) them and adjusting accordingly. By choosing news by yourself and reacting, you may speed up this process and make a search engine learn your preferences.
Using the internal features of social media
Almost all social media networks have hashtags now. They allow you to follow the most popular topics and refine your news feed. Sometimes you may use names instead of hashtags, other times, you just follow certain groups or people and make them appear on top of your news feed. Each social media platform has its own means and terms of adjusting your news feed to your preferences, the only thing you need is to learn how to use them.
It doesn’t work as smoothly as it seems sometimes. Search algorithms still try to slip something into your news feed, trying to make you see the content they wish you to see – either to broaden your sphere of interest (at best) or to modify your opinion on something (at worst). Be aware that search algorithms aren’t always your unquestionable friends, they may follow their own commercial agenda. So don’t be surprised if such an approach doesn’t work as perfectly as you want it in some social media.
Using third-party apps
If you don’t want to monitor all social media by yourself, try using some “virtual secretaries” instead. There are plenty of apps that monitor all social media (or at least many of them) and search for everything with the keywords you give them. Also, there’re some services like Like4Like that let you to follow trends on social media, use them to find news or interesting post and even promote yourself. There is plenty of ‘noise,’ of course, especially if the keyword you enter is extremely common, but you still will have several times less news to look through.
Another benefit of these apps is that they use all your social media accounts. You don’t have to log in every time; you don’t even have to open a new browser window. All the information is gathered into a neat table and is presented to you at once. The only obvious drawback of such apps is that they are mostly paid. Free versions have serious limitations, so, if you want to browse through the news like a pro, consider buying a pro version of one of them. The time they will spare you still costs more!
There are lots of ways to specify the news you want to see – geolocating the posts, searching for the rapidly trending ones, or even using secret channels to infiltrate some local groups. But the main principles available for everyone are described above. You don’t need to be a professional journalist to adjust your newsfeed or optimize your scrolling time. It isn’t fast, but easy and doesn’t require too much money if you are doing it for yourself, not for your business. Have fun with the news and good luck!
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