The first week of January keeps our minds blocked with a lot of fresh and innovative ideas. A new year has made its presence felt in our lives and we all are of the opinions of making new resolutions.

Yes, you have read it right, resolutions. Ideas or thoughts that have cropped up in our minds, but haven’t yet materialised. Resolutions like working hard, studying more, losing weight, etc. tend to occupy space in our free minds.

We all have some common resolutions, so let us take the pledge for a common topic i.e. Social media resolutions, and follow them. There is always a tendency within us to make and break the rules according to our wishes. For your convenience, below are listed a few resolutions that are not only easy to make, but also to follow the year round.

1. Making an amendment and regular checking of your privacy settings

We all have been boycotting this issue for a while now, but make it a point to check and update your privacy settings for all the social media sites, you have an account in. We are short of patience when it comes to filling up these settings. Facebook, has got its settings reconfigured and updated, in the gear-up to the new year. So, you should try and spend time in going through the changes and having a knowledge about them. Once done, it will be a cakewalk for the rest of the year.

2. A shorter Tweet is all it takes

Come February and we all will have to face a change in the way the Twitter URL shortener functions. There will be two more characters added to the shortened links, which will leave us with two less characters for a tweet. Going by the trend, it is noticed that their is maximum sharing of shorter tweets. So, set a target of tweeting within 120 characters and we all will get accustomed to it, in the long run.

3. Profiles on all accounts should be completed

For professional as well as personal reasons, we all, should go about completing our profiles on all social media accounts. For example, the primary words of a Twitter profile is of utmost importance for search engine giant, Google. So, make a habit of highlighting the important keywords in the beginning itself.

4. Increase your presence over atleast one new social media platform for weightage

Check your area of interest and indulge in a social network/platform that caters to your liking. For example, if you love playing around with videos, then you should download YouTube’s new Capture app for instant uploads on social sites. This will not only make connecting feasible, but will also increase your presence for 365 days.

5. Shed the extra baggage

A large number of followers is mostly present on Twitter. It is no harm in having such numbers, provided you know them or there are regular tweets from them. Chances are that all this does not occur. We can use tools like SocialBro to identify and mark the accounts that are not active. Doing so we can keep a check on the followers to following ratio, which will increase the mutual engagement.

6. A mannered approach makes a difference

Bypassing a tweet or status update is so common nowadays. It sometimes seems like a default setting incorporated in the account. Setting a tone for conversation is entirely in our hands. Always gear-up to ask questions as the attitude can prevent a “shoot at sight” approach.

7. Engage and follow the “rule of thirds”

People often tend to disconnect with those accounts that only have posts related to an individual. The main functioning area of social media sites is that they let you be “social.” Follow the “rule of thirds” and get benefitted. The rule lets you to share and promote personal news for one third of time, share and promote news of your interests generated from somewhere else for one third of time. The remaining one third should be spent on engaging topics like questionares, commenting and interacting with others. This will increase your social quotient.

8. Participation holds the key

Chatting your way on Twitter can be very helpful as this will help you meet a lot of like-minded people. Discussing with them can help us find solutions to many queries. This not only increases participation , but we also get to know a lot on related topics. So find an appropriate time, chat, ask questions and retweet the information that can be helpful for others as well.

9. Be a part of Google+

Once you create a profile and join Google+, there’s no one to hold you back in terms of social networking. It is an important step to ensure your supremacy in the eyes of search engines.

10. Don’t forget to trigger the “Subscribers” feature on Facebook

Activating this feature will help you maintain two different profiles, one personal and the other professional. You can manipulate your posts and viewing can vary according to your settings.

The above resolutions, if adhered to and followed throughout the 52 weeks, will soar your social quotient to newer heights. Make them your own, use them and get going…! Let 2013 be the year of “social-engagement.”