- Don’t friend your kids on Facebook. (Or, if you do, leave them alone.)
If your kids are on your social networking site, talk about and to them judiciously. (i.e. No motherly advice others can read; and make sure they get ten comments back from friends/peers for every one from you) - Don’t mix business with pleasure.
Keep separate social networking sites for personal and business relationships. Your coworkers don’t want to read the results of your “What breed of dog are you” quiz, and your friends don’t want to read about your latest niche marketing techniques. - Educate yourself about the social network you’re using.
Take the time to take a tutorial so that you make best use of all the features (i.e. Twitter and Vibrant Nation both have instructional videos to help you make the most of your experience.) You can’t fully participate in something you don’t understand, and your lack of understanding can make you an annoying user to others. - If it’s online, consider it public knowledge.
Don’t post anything online that you don’t want your kids/mother/husband/boss and/or the local newspaper to know. No matter how secure you believe you have your settings, errors happen. (Check out TechGal’s instructional post about Facebook
Privacy Settings.) - Link up!
Link your identities from Facebook, Twitter, etc. to your blog or website to create good synergy. There are also many applications that allow you to post updates to multiple social networks at once. This cuts down tremendously on the time it takes you to stay active on multiple sites. (For example, check out this tutorial about how to link Twitter and Facebook.) - Stay active, make your posts personal, and don’t spam.
Be an active reader and poster in conversations that pertain to your expertise. For instance, if you’re a marketing expert, the top marketing blogs should be on your daily reading list. Posting to those blogs will provide exposure. However, don’t post the same comment to multiple conversations just to get a link back to your blog or web site. Everyone sees this for what it is: spam.
What rule would you add to this list?
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Permalink: http://www.vibrantnation.com/live-it-lists/dont-be-annoying-6-rules-for-proper-social-networking-etiquette/
ReginaLove, that is SO great to hear! As for soy, it may help with menopause symptoms -- it it controversial. The best way to use soy is in the form of whole fermented soy foods (miso, tempeh, tamari and natto). Non-fermented soy foods such as soy mi
Agreed. I never thought I was vain until I had a mastectomy at age 39. I was devastated and told the doc I wanted to wake up with implants. Now at age 60, I am lopsided and wondering if I was just avoiding the inevitable. You get what you get and you
Sounds very interesting.
Spike, you are awesome! Love your perspective, thanks for sharing.
Thanks for this important post.
I already posted this once – but perhaps now bears repeating:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sheila-shayon/social-networking-as-spir_b_218935.html
This Facebook Connect is everywhere now. I am very reluctant to sign up for it — since you use your real name on Facebook, doesn’t that mean everyone will know who you are? It’s not that I have anything to hide, but it’s disturbing to think someone could, using Facebook Connect, see all the comments I posted.
You say keep comments personal, but again, how much personal information do I want to put out there? This issue is confusing to me, and while I would like to make new friends online, I haven’t been able to because I am reluctant to say too much.
I understand your fear, EllaMae. That’s why VibrantNation.com has carefully tailored our own Facebook Connect service to the interests and privacy concerns of our members. If you sign into VibrantNation.com using Facebook Connect, you remain in complete control of your privacy and posts. It does, however, offer a few benefits that our members have really enjoyed:
1. First, Facebook Connect is a convenient way to log into other sites (like VN) using your Facebook password. It doesn’t change your member name at VibrantNation.com.
2. If you log into VibrantNation.com using Facebook Connect and go to your own “My VN” page you will see a list of all of your Facebook friends who are also “vibrant women” (Facebook members who have identified their age as 46+). You will see which ones are already members of VN – and even better, you can invite those who aren’t yet members of VN to join!
3. If you have logged in using Facebook Connect, when you post a comment at VN you will have the option of sharing it on Facebook – but it will only be shared with your Facebook friends who are women over 45. (On Fcaebook, remember that the post will be shown under your real name, while it remains under your member name at VN.) It cannot be seen by anyone on Facebook unless (1) she is already your friend on Facebook and (2) she is a woman over 45.
Two small warnings: Facebook and AOL don’t get along, so if your email address is @aol.com, Facebook Connect will not work for you.
And finally, when you’re using Facebook Connect with other sites, please ask the same questions you’ve asked here, since each site can handle it differently.
I guess I’m lost. I don’t see any references on Facebook bringing me back here> Is it that when I log in here, I click on a “Facebook Connect” button and I’m logged on? If I don’t log off of Facebook, do I get to this site (which I can’t seem a means of doing)? Am I totally misunderstanding what is supposed to be happening? Does this site disconnect from Facebook when I log out (of either) or is there a means for changing the connection status?
Like I said, I’m lost
If you have something really personal to say to someone just email them directly without going to facebook.
don’t write and e-mail anything when you’re angry
You’ve got that one right! Here’s my fail-safe strategy. If it’s an angry or difficult email, I write it first being careful not to have the person’s email address already entered. I add that last, after I’ve got it completely right. Learned the hard way, after a premature finger slip!
Good advice….and . maybe, by the time you’re done writing the e-mail, you’ll have calmed down enough not to have to send it.
Congrats on your upcoming TV appearance
A note about friending your kids on Facebook: My experience tells me this is a very individual family issue. I know parent-child relationships where being Facebook-friends would not work at all, and others where it works quite well. There are a number of variables — age of children (teens are tough, 20-somethings easier), quality and stage of the parenting relationship, geographical locations, personalities of all involved, etc. I am Facebook friends with my two children, who are now in their 20′s, and for our family, it is a wonderful way to keep in touch, share photos, family news, jokes etc. That said, I agree that in general keeping a low profile on your child’s Facebook page is wise…
I agree with you catnickum……My daughter and I are connected , and so are some of our friends, to each other…..I just stay low profile…and try not to talk about her life….she doesn’t have a problem, at all, correcting me if I have the facts wrong! My son, of course, doesn’t touch facebook, my space, etc. with a ten foot pole! He thinks it is idiotic….To him computers are used for work, study, and playing games…..haha!
Oh my goodness, it’s you again! The woman who introduced me to Facebook! Not having children, my biggest issues are my cousins. I am biting my virtual tongue to not respond or comment on diametrically opposing political posts and surveys from her. I’m just using “I” messages in my own posts and sharing my own experience.
Funny! I have a friend who is at opposite ends of the spectrum politically than i am. She is a little on the pompous side, is an attorney taking time out for her children. She posts random news posts all the day long! Most of them are quite controversial.
I found myself getting so annoyed with her posts and her comments that I learned how to “hide posts” from a person so you don’t get their news feed. I did that and then when I’d see her comments on mutual friends postings, realized if it annoyed me so much, just drop the link – so i did and feel SO much better.
Also my cousin who has a home business posts marketing things every day and I had to hider her posts too! Now I just go to her page periodically to make sure i don’t lose touch with anything important. We can control our own lives and what we read! I’m happier now!
I know what you mean.
I have had a self appointed personal trainer demeaning me on facebook for about a year now. I finally just unfriended her. I feel so liberated.
It is too bad that people can’t just be kind and compassionate.
Everyone thinks they know what is best for everyone else.
Ugh!
Julee
I love Facebook….and yes, I have friended my teenage daughter because I told her it was the only way she could have her own FB page. I don’t bug her, but keep an eye on her activities and who she’s friending, etc.
FB has been a wonderful way to reconnect with old high school and college friends, as well as old co-workers from the past.
Every once in a while I go through and weed out what I don’t need.
my mother and her cousins made a packet not to let politics interfere with their love for one another and practice tolerance, it was a lovely example.
My grandfather found Reagan far to liberal, my mother was the hippie rebel and her cousins all along the spectrum.
they discussed literature travel music art etc much to their mutual delight and enjoyed one another immensely, they choose as a group to do so.
nannon, I have simply kept my mouth shut in the past in family circles re:politics. The FB situation has added a new twist because many people I’m friends with naturally share my sentiments, and I like being able to express myself. So, my FB circle is now including relatives, professional friends, and social friends. My cousin and I have had the discussion that we love each other anyway, in spite of our differing beliefs. I suppose I’ll just continue showing up as who I am, which is what she is doing, and trust that we can each tolerate our differences. Tolerating differences was not exactly how our family operated, but the cousin and I both like to travel, have some similar medical issues, like dogs, and contemporary design, so I suppose I can focus more on those things. One good thing we got in the family was a sense of humor, so that helps, too.
My son invited me to Facebook and then I became friends with our daughter and then the youngest, who was the hardest. But it is true, I post pictures leave comments and have more relationships with friends that I don’t always have the time to see. Now I see them on Facebook. One thing I should mention is if you are going away don’t mention it on Facebook there are those that have had bad things happen to them because their homes were empty. So if you plan on going away, either protect your house or post where you were and what you did when you come back home.
I just learned the hard way about posting pieces with names on Facebook. I was very angry with my daughters – with very good reasons – and referred to one as a “b”. She only told me about it the other day. She “googled” herself and found it. Now, she’s even angrier, with reason, because she’s looking to change jobs and is afraid that will come up.
This is a mea culpa. I may have made a faux pas on Facebook. I had my business, social and family friends all on my site. When my grandson was born, the nature of personal information being shared escalated in volume and intimacy. I decided to keep Facebook only for family, and others on Linked-in and Twitter…so I unfriended all but my immediate family without explanation to anybody. Now I’ve heard that I could have divided everybody into subgroups on Facebook, so this was unnecessary. Oh well. Live and learn.
Don’t drive your friends nuts posting about the games you play and asking them to help you with Farmville, etc.
Excellent advice about social networking, Carol.
Wouldn’t it just be great if Facebook allowed separate profiles for personal and business? That way, your personal feed would not be full of business info from others and your business feed would not be full of farmville requests.
You can do this. Because that’s what I have done. I have my personal page and my business page (Antiagingboomer) I can’t remember how I did it but I can find out.
I agree with these rules except not friending my children on Facebook. I know every family has a different dynamic, but FB is a means for me to keep up with their goings-on and I get to see all those cute photos of my grandkids that they post all the time. Of course, I don’t advise my daughters a good remedy for monthly cramps on FB, that’s just common sense. I will, however, continue to follow them and comment on their posts as appropriate. This is in regard to adult children in their late thirties, but I’d think parents would especially want to friend younger children on FB as a means of keeping them out of trouble.
It is interesting to put your name into Google and see what it reveals….Point number 4 is applicable in is this instance! Excellent advice, thank you.