As I wrote about recently, I’ve been having a dilemma ever since I watched The Social Dilemma. Well, as I also noted, I was struggling with social media even before that.
It seems so self-absorbed. It’s like a world full of children begging to be looked at. When it’s not riddled with bullies trying to tear others down, or misinformed masses spreading false information of all kinds, lately about COVID-19 and politics.
And then there are all the ads. The non-stop stream of being bombarded by someone constantly selling something.
Ugh. It’s exhausting.
Plus, it’s never felt quite right to me. There are times I want to share what I see in the world around me though. Social media is good for that. And can be fun.
I’ve also met some extraordinary people through Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, some of whom I consider friends.
Ever since I’ve stepped away, there are people I miss interacting with. I stopped actively posting much on Facebook weeks ago. Sometime in the summer I think. Maybe it was even early summer, which means I may be going on months not posting much.
I was still posting to the Haunt Jaunts page and even to A Haunt Mess’s.
Then there was Twitter. I had tried to get back to being active there. When I first started HJ in 2009, Twitter was my favorite social. I met interesting people and discovered info about great events and such.
Then somewhere along the way I lost interest. Other than sharing links I really hadn’t been posting much.
But my A Haunt Mess co-hosts loved it and used it a lot and I wanted to participate with them. So I got back on.
However, it wasn’t long before I remembered why I’d pretty much abandoned interacting on Twitter. That’s where I draw the most negative interactions.
I have thick skin so I don’t really care what’s said, but I have no patience. It annoys me to have to see Trolls spewing hate.
That’s kind of what started me thinking, “Do I really need social media? Isn’t there a better use of my time?”
Well, yes.
But it’s not like 13 years ago when I first started blogging. Socials were just being born and all the authors I knew started hopping on them after seeing a few people have success selling books and becoming popular.
So that’s when it became a new marketing tool.
And admittedly it can be a powerful one…if you have the time and savvy.
And books or other products to promote, of course.
But I’m easily distracted and socials is partly what I’ve wasted my time on instead of focusing on writing my books.
Because it’s hard for me to blog, promote that on socials and write books apparently.
So the obvious choice is to give one up and socials seems the most obvious.
But do I still need them to promote Haunt Jaunts and to help my co-hosts promote A Haunt Mess?
Socials don’t direct a lot of traffic to my blog. I looked at it a bit closer and realized Facebook actually dominates them all (between it, Twitter and Insta.) It brings in about 5-6% of the 7-8% of traffic I get from socials. (I thought it was closer to 10%, which it’s not.)
Instagram is my favorite social really, and while it has the best bounce rate of all my socials (under 70%, which is always a goal), it doesn’t net many visitors. (.19%)
Which, I am a proponent of quality over quantity, so I could make an argument for why I want to keep Insta in HJ’s repetoire, but I also know it’s tied with them all for how I can easily spiral down a rabbit hole there. Taking two minutes to make a post can end up into 20 (or more, often more) minutes disappearing.
Time is the most important thing to me now. I don’t have time to be on all three. Well, double it for all three, because I’m on them all for HJ and personal. Triple for Facebook if I count managing A Haunt Mess’s Facebook page.
Clearly, that’s not sustainable. Not if if I want to accomplish my other goals too.
But I’m not going to lie. At first staying away was easy. I felt jubilant making the decision to get off them, and I was positively gleeful when I made my last posts on each.
But this week I’m struggling. The impulse to share posts and pictures is strong.
I know part of it is because it’s become a habit. That’s what you do these days. Share, share, share.
But another part of it is because it is a way to network. Like A Haunt Mess is doing today for International Podcast Day with The Fun with Friends podcast.
And Haunted Walk approached me about a partnership to promote its new product “The Haunting at Home – A Paranormal Adventure.” I hooked not only Haunt Jaunts up with that but also A Haunt Mess too.
It’s good to interact with others that way too.
Sharing on socials is also a good way to build name and brand recognition. The more people who see your name on various platforms will start to pay attention. Especially if they see your name pop up on a variety of accounts across a variety of platforms.
I know all this but I’m burnt out. Right during the season I love best and that most embodies everything I do.
It’s a real conundrum. I wish I still had the love and passion for promoting. I think I realized a hard truth thanks to this pandemic that I’d been focusing so much on socials and growing my numbers that I wasn’t putting out the best content I wanted to. I wasn’t putting out hardly any of the content that I wanted to. I’d put too much priority on growing my numbers, which in the end don’t matter if people are not clicking to listen to my podcast episodes, watch my videos, or read my blogs.
I don’t know if this will hurt me or not taking a step back from socials, but I do know it has freed me to create like I want to, so…I will continue to do that and hope for the best. The “best” being that those who are meant to find me somehow will or I’ll find new ways to reach them.
Or maybe I’ll decide I need to work socials back in after all. Who knows? Time will tell…
What about you? How do you handle social media? Are you only on it for a set amount of time each day? Only on certain days? Asking for a friend…