social media bullying

Bully (n.) a blustering, quarrelsome, overbearing person who habitually badgers and intimidates   smaller or weaker people.

Nobody is a stranger to the term. Bullying is rampant in our society, and has become more so with the technology we have today. It seems to be easier than ever for bullying to take place with texting and the lightening-fast social media tools of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, You Tube, and so on. So many of our youth are armed with their cell phones, and they seem to be connected to their devices 24-hours a day. How do we as a society address this problem?

Too many of our young people have fallen victim to bullying; some teens have even taken their own lives due to the extreme bullying they have endured. This tragedy should never again occur.

As parents, teachers, community leaders, adults, it is our duty it is our due diligence to put a stop to this.  Handing over the computers, tablets, cell phones to young people should come with strings attached. Adults should have full access to these devices, and the social media accounts that are being utilized, to keep a watchful eye on the conversations taking place. Just as we would not hand over the car keys to someone without the proper training, we should practice the same with texting and social media.

I am a believer that an individual's privacy should be respected, and this can become a battle between parent and child; but if there is nothing to hide, that becomes a moot point. Finding balance and establishing trust is key to making this work. Let's not let another young person's life end too soon because we are not vigilant in protecting them.

Social media tips you can use now

In an ongoing series, we will discuss social media tips you can put to work right now. 

Today’s topic is scheduling and time management.

I frequently hear the same question: how much time should a business owner or professional spend on social media per day or week? My general response is most maintenance work (responding to posts and requests, sharing, pinning/re-pinning, and re-tweeting, etc.) can be done in less than 20 minutes per day. However, to do this, one must set aside a larger chunk of time during the week (Sunday afternoon?) to schedule posts in advance.

• Create a plan: what will you discuss/post for the next week?  Will you post photos, tips of the day, blog or article links? Collect all your information, and check that your links are correct. Use a link shortener if necessary: www.bit.ly and www.ow.ly are easy tools that are free and can track your links.

• Use a scheduling tool. Facebook has a post scheduler right on the status update bar, and it is very easy to review and/or edit scheduled posts from the Activity Log. Hootsuite.com is an effective tool that offers several packages; the free plan allows users to manage up to 5 social media sites, which is generally sufficient for most business owners and professionals. And then there is TweetDeck, another free tool that integrates Twitter with other social media sites. Pingraphy.com offers scheduling for Pinterest; package prices vary.

• Go old-school: use a timer! Don’t spend any more time on social media sites than you really want. Social media is meant to be just one of the tools in your marketing tool kit, and it is meant to be FUN! So, take those online relationships offline, and enjoy your life!