I am going to give you my best social media advice today.
That is it: before implementing any social media advice from articles look at the date the article was written.
People are always surprised when I tell them that hashtags are irrelevant in Pinterest or that Google Authorship is dead.
The usual response is, “but I just read a post yesterday that said I should! I’m so confused.”
Here’s the thing with social media and search engines: they are constantly changing.
If the article is older than 6 months, chances are it is out of date.
How to find current social media tips
Check to see if the post is updated. Some authors will write in the beginning of their article that they have updated the post to reflect social media changes. All of my posts include the day it was posted and the day it was last updated.
If the article does not have a visible date (my biggest blogging pet peeve) go down to the comment sections and see when the first comments were made, this will give an idea of when the post was published.
If there is a specific subject you want to learn more on, use Google search to only display articles from a certain time frame.
- Type in your search topic
- Click search tools
- Click anytime
- Choose your time frame
I think this is the shortest blog post I have ever written, but I want make sure you stay current.
What social media tips do you see bloggers implementing that are outdated?
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What great advise!! Thanks Kristie!
You’re welcome.
What a great help! I am newer to the blogging world and have been doing a lot of research and then keep realizing the material is older and not as current. Great advice. Thank you.
Your welcome Kara, thanks for atopping by. For being newer to the blogging world, your site is looking great. Keep it up!
OMG you just made my day and saved me time! I did not know about the calendar timeframe thing and I NEED THAT! I love you! We have to meet someday! 🙂
Somehow I am just seeing this comment. Glad I helped you with your googling. Meeting would be fun. Hope you’re enjoying your blogging break.
Yes, exactly! I keep seeing the same thing about SEO related articles. Some people keep quoting tips they’ve read in other people’s articles but they don’t realise that things have changed a lot since that post was written…
That’s a good point Ashley, sometimes you can’t even trust the date published, because they might have based their research on the subject off of outdated posts. Oye
Great advice! I should probably be reading more articles like that but it does feel like it changes twice a day at least 🙂
I know, so why bother? Ha.
Hi Kristie,
Very good piece of advice, and, I never knew that Google had that tool. I guess I am too used to type and hit enter. Thank you!!!
It’s one of my favorite tools of Google search. It is also a great way to find giveaways.
Kristie, I’m so glad that I am not the only blogger disliking the current trend to leave the dates off of posts. And when they remove the dates from the comments also…it’s hard to know when it was written.
My rule of thumb is, if it is not current, or it it’s not dated, leave it alone.
I’ve been getting newsletters from known bloggers who are recycling “new tips” posts from almost a year ago…and unsuspecting bloggers are pinning them thinking that they are relevant.
Jen
I too am glad to see someone else not liking the trend. They have been leaving them off because they want their content to appear “evergreen”. But lets face it, very little content is actually evergreen.
My goal with this post was to warn those unsuspecting bloggers pinning irrelevant content!
Oh wow! That is such good advice. I agree that dates are very important and I often look at the first-thing when I click on a blog. Thank you for sharing with us!
You’re welcome Aidyl! Glad you’re already on top of things by checking the dates.