In today’s ever-changing, ever-growing, ever-present social media world, it can be really easy to talk over yourself. Or be overwhelmed by all of the clutter that hits our feeds, our walls, our email in-boxes.

Do a vanity search (i.e. plug your name into Google) and check out all of the social media platforms you’ve been on, some of which have come and gone.  Whether you’re a business or working on personal branding, there comes a time to evaluate your social media and ditch the clutter. Why keep the Myspace account you never use, or the blog you haven’t touched in a year when social media is all about being current, informative and on-message?

Focus on the social media platforms you have time to use, update and profit from. Focus on the ones that will work for you. Just because everyone else is doing it doesn’t mean you have to. Jumping onto every single social media platform is more than a negative than it is a positive.

We know companies going all-in on social media can go too far, putting out too much with too many voices talking over one another. And they wind up diluting the original message, the reason they dove into social media in the first place. You can do the same with your personal branding efforts.

I’ve never believed the number of likes or followers you have measures personal networking success in its entirety. It should be about quality over quantity, reaching people you actually want to reach, and getting information you actually want. Why scroll through tweet after tweet or post after post on topics that don’t matter to you at all? It makes more sense to go through your twitter followers, your Facebook friends and weed out the dead weight.

The more clutter you cut, the more focused and effective your social media efforts will be.

By Genevieve Jooste