CHARLOTTE – This is part 2 in a several part series about social media algorithms

Curate your feed.

Your news feed is made up of a combination of updates from people you are connected with, brands you follow, and ads. 

While you have 100% control over who you become friends with and which brands you choose to follow, you don’t have control over how many of their updates you see or what ads you’re served. 

The algorithm does that for you. 

Last week I wrote about the importance of not stopping to read and especially not interacting with posts you don’t like, even if you are stopping to say you don’t like it. 

Here’s what to do instead: hide the post, ad, or unfollow the account. 

Hiding a post or even unfollowing someone or a brand doesn’t mean you delete them completely, it simply means you are choosing not to have that particular update or all of their updates in your feed. 

You are still free to visit their account and see what they are posting. I find I am far less likely to make comments I’ll regret later this way, it reminds me that I am on their account or page, sort of like visiting their house. When posts show up in your feed, it can feel intrusive, like they are in your space. 

Hiding ads not only helps the algorithm to know which ads you do and don’t like, it also helps businesses get better results from them as well.