Social Media Etiquette

5 Social Media Etiquette Tips

Since social media is, well, a social medium, it’s important that users understand the proper ways to behave online. No, just because you’re behind a computer monitor doesn’t mean all social etiquette goes out the window. It’s quite the opposite—following proper social media etiquette is a key to being successful online. How do you act in real life and public?

1. Give More than You Receive If you want to receive attention from others online, you have to be willing to give it first. It’s the old “I’ll scratch your back if you scratch mine” routine. You can’t bust onto a social media site with a sense of entitlement thinking you should be a top user immediately. You have to earn respect from others. How do you do this? By giving more than you receive.

2. Be authentic, approachable, and maintain integrity while branding yourself on-line. People want to get to know you. Make sure your avatar (photo) is of you and not a logo or something not relevant to you. I personally don’t care to follow people without pictures, bio, or a website. I want to know a little about how follow.

3. Develop relationships Do you barge into a group of people at a live social gathering and start promoting yourself and your product without getting to know people? Do not direct sell yourself or your products/service without developing relationships first. People are more willing to help those who they really know. By building quality relationships with other users, you’ll always have someone in your corner to back you up. Remember, relationships require the participation of both parties.

4. Add value to the community At the end of the day, the thing that will earn you great connections with others is if you add value to the community. This means not submitting content that nobody cares about and not constantly promoting your service or product. Before you ever submit anything to a social media site, ask yourself “Does this article really add value to the community?” If not, reconsider submitting it.

5. Integrity Build relationships with integrity and honesty just like you would in person. Don’t try to be someone you’re not just to get several followers. Eventually you may meet people in person so be honest and maintain integrity in everything you do.

6. Listen to Others Your first reaction whenever someone disagrees with you online is probably to tell them how wrong they are. Instead of fighting back, take the time to listen to what they’re really saying. Listen to the people commenting on your blog or Tweeting at you. Understand where they’re coming from. You don’t know everything, and you can learn from others if you take the time to listen.

7. Bottom line Interact with people on-line just like you would in person. Show respect, have integrity at all times, and be yourself.