I posted this on my Facebook wall recently, but thought I'd share it here as well and expand on my original post because so many using Facebook to connect these days are frustrated and confused. Some urgent prayer requests have gone unanswered and the friends who posted them were left feeling as if nobody cared!
In our microwave society of techie EVERYTHING, we have become accustomed to Minute Rice, Instant Coffee, and Fast Friends. But the truth is that friendships online take as much effort as they do OFFline. And now that Facebook has made social media a bit less social with each passing day, it is going to take a bit more effort on our part to maintain friendships even online.
Facebook Experiment Results: If you want to see more of your friends' posts, you need to search them out and...LIKE, COMMENT, and SHARE!
Here's the deal. Tons of my FB friends are complaining that nobody is replying to their posts. After a few weeks, I've come to believe this is a two part problem.
1. Facebook has been slowly decreasing the number of posts it will show to friends/fans in the hopes that we will spend money to let more of our Facebook family know what we ate for dinner.
2. Facebook users are only using their newsfeed (which is preset and keeps defaulting back to) Top Stories which only shows you a small segment of your friends (typically only the ones you frequently like and comment on).
So here's what I found worked for me to be able to see more of my friends' posts. If this is to work, ideally we all need to do this so I can see yours and you can also see mine and others.
1. Periodically change Top Stories back to Recent Posts so you can see Facebook friends that Facebook didn't see fit to be part of your regular newsfeed because they don't interact with you enough.
2. Like, comment on, and share as many as you can.
You will need to keep changing Top Stories back to Recent Posts as Facebook will keep switching it back. You may also have to go directly to the Facebook wall (or fan page) of some because Facebook will never show them to you (you may not be online when they are).
Do this for a few days to a week and you will notice that Facebook will begin to show you more of your friends' posts. The more you do this, the more you'll see.
Keep in mind that, while you will see more of them, they will not see more of you unless they do the same so pass it on!
It's kind of like the effort it takes to communicate and foster relationships in the real world. We need to make an effort. If you don't call your friend and/or invite them to spend time with you, they probably won't take the time to call you or spend time with you either. Offline relationships take effort and, though we all got used to not having to expend as much energy to cultivate our online relationships, we SHOULD! After all, don't YOU appreciate it when someone, whether off or on line, takes the time to search you out, listen and respond to your issues? Just because you can't see the face on the other side of your screen doesn't mean there isn't one. And below that face is a heart and feelings and needs just like yours.
Take the time. Communicate. Follow up. Seek out. Support. Use your social skills BOTH online and offline and you will create much deeper and more meaningful relationships with fewer misunderstandings and conflicts.
What has been your recent Facebook experience?