I stumbled upon something valuable from hangin’ out with millennials and we’ve discovered another way to use social media in a generous and productive way.
Here’s how it goes down. When I’m meeting up with people and having an engaging conversation, I’ll do a public Facebook check-in on my timeline and tag the place and person I’m meeting with and use the hashtag #chatnotes. Then, as we talk about things and mention useful resources and links, we’ll add comments to that post! (Apparently, invented the hashtag back in November 2015.)
1. Real-time updates. We live in a 24/7 world and we don’t have to delay sharing something meaningful and useful with the world. cf. I love real-time updates and open information.
2. No more taking notes. When I mention someone or something, I can share it right away with the person I’m meeting with and they don’t have to write it down and I don’t have to spell it out loud.
3. Efficiently less work. Instead of making a note to self, creating a task on my checklist to do later, and sending a follow-up email, we skip all those extra steps and share the links on the spot! Forget GTD. Just get there already. Done.
4. Eco-friendly. Most of us have smartphones and we don’t need to be writing in a paper notebook. Plus, eliminate that extra step of either transcribing your notes later or scanning your notes to save into Evernote.
5. Share the joy far and wide. We live in a sharing economy and I love being a part of the open source movement. Share once to benefit the many. Don’t let money get in the way of great ideas. Also see: How to innovate on $0 budget; How to freely give as you have freely received.
6. Make Facebook uber-useful. One of the excuses I hear from people that don’t like using Facebook is that they don’t want to read updates about what people are eating or mundane events of life and wading through screenfuls of selfie photos or wading through the clutter of sponsored posts and ads or the viral meme of the day. #chatnotes are both useful and valuable.
7. Memorability. I can scroll back my timeline or click on hashtag #chatnotes to quickly recall a link or resource or video to something I had a conversation with someone and share it again with someone else. Beats frantically searching my stashes of notes in Evernote or clicking through tons of emails or browsing folders.
A couple of quirky caveats.
- Facebook hashtags are not viewable via mobile browser.
- Hashtag #chatnotes (https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/chatnotes) IS viewable by the public on a desktop browser, even if not logged-in.
- But these Facebook posts are not (currently) crawled by search engines, even Facebook’s.