Do you find yourself on Facebook all most everyday trying to add friends, grow your business, or build your online presence? Do you spent a ton of time building your homepage or building up your own group.? Do you love all the available quizzes or trying every new app that comes into your inbox? If this sounds like you, stop asking yourself if Facebook is a waste of time.
Facebook is a wonderful marketing platform you just have to learn how to use it. According to Nelsen Online June Report Facebook is #1, when it comes to internet usage. Facebook’s average visitor now spends an average of 4 hours and 39 minutes a month on Facebook. That’s a lot of time wasted. But I’m here to show you how to turn your time into productive work and money for your business.
So here are some of the main ways we waste time on Face book everyday.
1. Receiving Too Many E-mails From Facebook
E-mails are getting out of control. You get one every time anyone does anything on your Facebook page. So you need to go in to your setting tab under Account Settings and go to Notifications. Turn as many of the notifications off that you don’t want e-mails for. This step will save you from deleting all those extra e-mails and keep your inbox empty.
2. Setting Up A Task List
Every morning when I open my Facebook page, I already know what task I have. My task list is on a spread sheet on my computer. It includes checking my inbox, adding friends, inviting friend to my group, and many others. This allows me to stay focused and on track.
3. Adding To Many Apps
If you find yourself opening your Facebook everyday and playing 20 minutes of texas hold’em, it might be time to delete all your apps. Facebook has thousands of apps and you can spend hours a day playing games and taking quizzes. Its hard to stay away from these apps. I use just a handful of apps to help me be more productive. So until you are ready to stop playing all these apps you are going to be wasting a lot of time.
4. Combine Facebook & Twitter
Now hold on, I don’t mean post every one of your tweets on Facebook. Facebook is not twitter and a lot of updates will make your friends mad. What I do mean is use a desktop client like Tweetdeck. Tweetdeck allows you to send the updates you want to Facebook with just a click of the mouse. It also allows you to not have to open your Facebook page every time you want to make a post.
5. Build Lists
Sort all of your friends into lists. I know this one is very simple, but it will save you time looking for people. Especially when you need to send e-mails to just your family or business partners, not your whole list.
6. Joining Groups
If you join a group for everything you like, you can almost bet you will have 50 e-mails a day in your inbox. Only join a handful of groups and make sure the group doesn’t send you spam everyday.
7. Replying
Replying to your inbox could take hours if you spend 10-15 minutes for ever reply. So what I do is keep my replies very short. I reply to all the questions I get, but many of them will point people to my blog where they can find the answers. This is a hard line to walk. If you keep your replies too short you could seem mean and unfriendly, so make your pick of the ones to answer personally and direct the rest to your blog ,where their answers already are written where they can see. Just find out what works for you.
8. IM Chat
Perhaps you logged in to Facebook to have a quick look, but a friend saw you online and began talking to you. You think, “Ok, just a few words.” Next thing you know, you’ve lost 30 minutes How to avoid the IM chat trap? Go offline in chat all of the time. It will save you hours a week.
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{ 11 comments… read them below or add one }
Great tips on marketing on Facebook. I agree about combining twitter and Facebook. I will definitely keep them in mind. Thanks for sharing!
That one tip saves me a lot of time. I love Tweetdeck I have been using it for sometime now. Plus it’s free can’t beat that.
Thanks for posting the article from your blog John! You make some great points. There is one point I would like to make… The danger of turning off your chat, is that you might miss the opportunity to connect with a possible client, who might say helllo – which gives you the opportunity for them to get to ‘know, like and trust you’ through a conversation – even through a CHAT conversation. I have a couple of clients who came through this tool. Now that is worth $$$ for a few 20min chats! Its up to you how long you stay on for, just be clear on your boundaries… or work with a coach
if you’re not. Keep up the great work!
Great Point Louise. I love the feed back and the added value to the post. Would love to hear more of your thoughts on future posts.
I agree with Louise, CHAT is an awesome tool to connect with a new client or team member.
Very very valuable article, Thank you for sharing these “time wasters”. I got an idea, I am gonna print it and put it on my work board. Thanks again John
Thanks Marius I hope they help out at work!
Nice tips… I follow them already
John, in your opinion, how much is “too much” personal information on Facebook when you have a wide and varied following? For example, seems these days people are pretty comfortable putting pictures of their kids, and even names of their family members (to build the credibility factor) – though once upon a time that may have been considered to be crossing a line.
Thanks,
(twitter) SV_RE_Investor
Great Question!
This is hard to answer in a reply so I’m going to make this a upcoming post on my blog so stay tune and thanks for the great question!
John Marshall
Great tips, simple and to the point. Thanks.