By Jennifer Henderson

I am a stay-at-home mom of an adorable, yet very active four year old. I also work part-time as a writing tutor and freelance editor/writer. Like most people, I am busy. And, I find it difficult keeping up with social media. When I say, “keeping up with social media,” I don’t necessarily mean keeping up with all of the changes in social media (that’s another blog altogether). Instead, I mean staying on top of the daily updates my friends, colleagues, and professional organizations post on sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Too much social media can definitely lead to information overload. But, social media is here to stay and can provide value to all of our lives (social interaction, networking opportunities, professional development). How can we learn to tame the information overload “monster,” so that participating in social media works to our benefit?

Change your thinking

My friend was telling me the other day that she feels guilty when she doesn’t find the time to look at her Facebook account. We both feel if we don’t check social media regularly we might miss out on something important. There’s so much information, though, how can we find the time to process it all?

“No matter how fast you read, how much time you take, how much effort you make, it’s impossible to keep up with every piece of new information…come to terms with that and reframe your expectations,” writes Dan Himmon, on his social media strategy blog.

What great advice! Change your thinking. Don’t feel guilty if you can’t read every Facebook post or Twitter link. Do what you can and don’t feel like you should be keeping up with it all. If something is really important, you will find out about it.

Customize what you want

Because there is so much information online, you need to be picky about what you spend your time on. What do you want to read? What status updates are important to you? If you’ve moved recently, do you really need to read what your former dentist is up to?

An article in Relevant magazine encourages social media users to “choose those you follow intentionally—and even sparingly.” In addition, the article reminds us to use social media management tools to simplify all the information. “Hootsuite, TweetDeck and many other programs and apps have filter features you can use to curate who you’re reading instead of just scrolling through a large crowd.”

Schedule your time

In a previous blog post, I talked about the importance of scheduling time to respond to e-mails. The same goes for interacting with social media. If you try to keep up with social media all day long, you will never get anything else accomplished. Instead, set aside time each day to look at social media. For instance, if you go online and check Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn for about 30 minutes each morning and evening, and you stick to that time frame, you might find that’s enough time to read and interact with the posts that matter most to you.

How do you manage information overload?

Everyone has strategies for managing information overload. We’d love to hear your approaches in the comments below. Do you participate in social media, and, if so, how do you manage your time? What tools and tactics do you find helpful?