Excited to be on vacation? Want to share your excitement with friends and family? Something happening in your life you want to share? Whatever we do, we are bound to annoy so someone on Facebook.
After all you are no doubt annoyed by someone’s post or comments once in a while, so it makes sense that your actions probably annoy someone else.
One of my pet peeves revolves around posting travel updates. It’s the “We loved it there” type of comment.
Here you are on vacation. You take a moment in the hotel room to put your feet up and post a few photos for friends and family to enjoy. And then comes the subtle brags that everyone seems to have been there before you.
“We stayed at the XYX hotel it was the best”
“Have dinner at $$$$ restaurant, you won’t forget it”
“The last time I was there we saw a grizzly bear”
“We are going back next month when the weather is best”
I’ve been guilty of this myself. Usually motivated by a desire to help travelers not miss a hidden gem that we discovered. But my suggestions are probably annoying as people post after they’ve been in an area. Kind of sucks to remind them of something they might have driven by or not had time to see.
According to an Inc. article the following seven types of social media updates are annoying. But really what else are we going to post on social media? If anything social media was made for life updates.
Seven types of social media updates are irritating your friends
- The straight-up brag – “post making your life sound great, either in a macro sense (got your dream job, got your degree, love your new apartment) or a micro sense (taking off on an amazing trip, huge weekend coming up, heading out on a fun night with friends, just had an amazing day).”
- The Cliffhanger – We’ve all seen these posts. Some cryptic message about something happening yet not details or conclusions. Maybe a random photo that only adds to the mystery and then no follow-up.
- The mundane – A photo of your morning coffee or a random grilled cheese sandwich. Does anyone really need to see this?
- Something that should be kept private – Random messages that should be kept private. It’s annoying to drop into a conversation that should be private.
- Over the top gratitude – public thank you’s that go on and on. Some of these are hidden brags which make them even more annoying. For example “A great big shout out to the grocery store bagger who carefully bagged the special cake I bought for my girl who got a perfect score on the SATs. It made my day that the cake was in great shape for the party.”
- The obvious opinion – Just chiming in with the most basic expression of sympathy or congratulations, is just adding to the noise.
- The nugget of wisdom – Do people really need a dusted of old chestnut like “a stitch in time” when they just suffered some setback? For your words alone to be inspirational, you need to be a gifted speaker or writer who really has something original to say,