For a lot of people, social media is considered to be a waste of time.  It is certainly true that it can be.  It can also be the complete opposite of that.  There are hundreds of articles about Social Media and Social Responsibility out there on the Internet, both pro and con on social media.  It all depends on how we use it and for what purpose. Perhaps, as Quintin L. Cook suggested, we should use it as a servant rather than a distraction.

I have noticed in my years of teaching family history and genealogy, that there are a lot of people that just don’t want to be bothered learning how to use and engage in social media.  Others feel they just don’t have anything to share.  There is so much more to using social media than that!  Perhaps paradigms can be changed by knowing a little bit more about it and how to use it for good.

There are some very wonderful benefits in using social media in ways that uplift and unite people. The teaching and learning from others with common goals and interests is great.  On a personal level, it can help us stay connected with our family members and friends who live in other places.  That alone makes social media a necessity for us as our immediate family is really spread out.  Facebook is a wonderful help in locating living relatives for family history purposes as well.

For many of us, Facebook is a place to learn so much that we want to know about doing our family history. Keeping current is so important.  The Family History Guide is just such a place with its amazing learning system and thousands of resources.  Our use of social media can keep you up to date.  Once you have created an account on the various social media platforms you can access our social media content from The Family History Guide itself.  From the home page just go to the dropdown menu Blog/Social to access our two Facebook pages and more.   We try to help everyone discover what is new, relevant and enhanced on our website each week. The updates are done to make your experiences easier, more efficient and more enjoyable. Here are a few things about each of the social media platforms where we have a presence.

FACEBOOK:   Did you know that Facebook has over 2.2 billion users? It is the # 1 social media choice around the world according to my Google search today. Surely some of those are your relatives!  I have found that The Family History Guide’s Facebook group for Consultants, Trainers, and Directors has become a wonderful place to connect with others and learn from each other. If you’d like to participate just ask to join. Go to Facebook:  Search for The Family History Guide-Consultants, Trainers, and Directors. Or search for The Family History Guide for our main page. They each contain a lot of the same posts. The trainers’ page is just more interactive about training and teaching family history. Facebook has literally thousands of pages related to family history and can be extremely helpful for searching and connecting with others, with a common surname or localities of interest and many other topics.  You are likely to find a lot of second and third cousins on Facebook!  They often have information you don’t about various common relatives and ancestors.

TWITTER:  Twitter had 326 million users in 2018.  Twitter posts, called tweets, are limited to 240 characters and you can add a photo also in your tweets.   What a lot of people don’t understand is that 240 characters also includes links. Those links can have as many characters as you want.   So when I post on Twitter I always add a link to something in The Family History Guide.  I like to use it to quickly find a post from the past without having to scroll through Facebook to find it.  I use it as an index to make sure I haven’t missed any posts on our Blog.  It might be useful to you in the same way if you want to revisit something you have read before. Of course for the blog posts, you can look at the archived posts and use the Categories and Tags to find them. I love following other people on Twitter that are also genealogists and family historians.  It is a great place to network and learn a lot.  If you have never ventured into Twitter, give it a try!  Just go into twitter.com and create an account.  Then you can find us @thefhguide.  You can “like” and comment on the tweets or retweet (share) on your own page.

PINTEREST & INSTAGRAM:  Pinterest has over 250 million users and over 75 billion pins!  Instagram is the 2nd most used platform by marketers worldwide!  These sites are both visually-oriented social media platforms. The Family History Guide is active on both.  We have lots and lots of images on Pinterest.  If you drill down by clicking on the image you will find they are attached to a link with the information you can use for your family history. Not all images on Pinterest are connected to links. There are hundreds of family history boards on Pinterest as well.

Instagram is loved by lots of people and young people especially!  We are just now getting started on Instagram for the Family History Guide.  Again, you create an account and then you can follow others like personal friends and family and entities like The Family History Guide, along with other companies and organizations.  Like Pinterest, some images contain links if you click on them.

YOUTUBE:  On YouTube, more than 4.5 billion hours are watched per DAY!  50% of YouTube users use it for learning new things. A Google search I did this morning states that 300 hours are uploaded to YouTube every single minute. The numbers are staggering!  Social Media is here to stay. The Family History Guide has a wonderful YouTube Channel for your enjoyment and learning. It is growing in content all the time, with plans to add a lot more.

BLOGS:  I have been blogging for over 11 years on a variety of subjects. Along with that, I enjoy doing social media posting for the Family History Guide because I am passionate about how The Family History Guide helps people.  A blog is defined as a shortened version of weblog where people post personal thoughts and web links.  They are used by individuals and companies and organizations as well.  They are meant to be interactive.  People write and others hopefully respond or engage, with “likes” or comments, etc.  All social media has the intended capability of people engaging with others.   You can jump right in and talk with the writers, share your opinions and ask questions. On the Family History Guide Blog, you will find a place to comment after the article and just below the photo displays of Related Posts. We welcome your comments! Thank you for following this blog and other platforms where we are posting content to keep you up to date.   Hopefully, it enriches your experiences and answers your questions about The Family History Guide website. Our aim is to make your family history journey better!