As someone who's main projects involve using the Internet, it sometimes becomes easy to get sidetracked while surfing the web. Using a combination of time management, smart media consumption, and prioritization, I ended up developing a quick and effective way of managing my time online, all while using my browser's Bookmark bar. Here's how I did it and how you too can use Bookmarks to better manage your time online.Plan Out Your Days In Advance
The first step that we need to accomplish is to decide which days you will spend the majority of your time online or which days you plan to use the web.
A couple of months ago, I went without Social Media and news for thirty days and it was an experience that I found to be quite pleasant. In those days I was not constantly bombarded with breaking news, status updates, or whatever lunch my friends were having. This small break was just what I needed to clear my mind and it was something peaceful that I enjoyed doing. Seeing as how the thirty day experiment was something that I had fun with, I wanted to apply a "mini-break" session in my week so even if I don't do thirty-days once a year I can still do three days every week. With this in mind, I decided that the days where I would be spending my time online the most would be Monday through Thursday. That way, I can have Friday, Saturday, and Sunday off without being wired to a screen.
The days that you decide spend your time online can be any variation of days. Maybe you'd like your online time to be on the weekends. Maybe you prefer a hop system like Monday-Wednesday-Friday. Maybe your online days are better suited for weekdays. So long as you select a plan that works for you, you'll be well on your way to better managing your time.
Once you have selected your days you can create a Bookmark folder and label it the selected days you decided. Using my own personal example, I created a "Monday/ Wednesday" and "Tuesday/ Thursday," folder on my Bookmarks bar. Again, you can use any combination of days you like, simply create a folder for your selected days.
Decide On the Content
After you have selected the days that you plan to to be online, it's now time to decide what content you want to view for those days.
Personally, I find that I get most of my entertainment, news, and ideas from video game and technology websites. For me, video games and technology are (if not entertaining!) topics that I care about so I make sure that I'm always up to date with those news. I am also interested in sports, but quite frankly I care more about my team's schedule rather than the news. Since I enjoy sports but not sports news, I skip the sports news altogether to save time. The point that I'm trying to make here is that you can decide what you would like to view on your online days.
Whether that is keeping up with world events, politics, technology, sports, cat pictures etc. Find content that you enjoy and balance it out evenly in your selected days. For example, you can view cat pictures on Monday and save politics for Tuesday. Or you can read up on sports every Tuesday and save technology news for a Friday. Simply select the media that you feel you enjoy the most.
Once you have selected your content, add them to the Bookmark folders that you created. When you add the websites to the folder make sure that you delete the "Name," of the website. The reason for this is one, that it saves space on your folder, and two that it plays a solid part in the next step.
Choose the Appropriate Times for Each Website
Now that you have your set days and the websites that you would like to view on your days online, it's time to decide on the amount of time that you would like to spend on each website.
Again using myself as an example, I only tend to read technology and video game news which makes my daily time online daily roughly around thirty minutes. I also like to take part in social media activities like commenting and distributing +1's, so that's an extra twenty minutes into the mix. All in all, I make it a goal to not go over one hour of online activity. For the websites in my Bookmark folders, rather than having the "Name" of the website displayed, I label each one with the time I would like to spend on the topic. For example, instead of using the name "Lifehacker" for lifehacker.com, I change the name to "15 Min," to remind myself that I would only like to be on the website for fifteen minutes. The same goes with my favorite video game website and I title it "15 Min," respectively.
Simply change the name of the website into the time that you would like to spend on your selection. Once you complete your allotted time, continue with completing your other websites. Once you have established a good routine you'll be spending more time being informed on the topics that matter to you most and you'll be spending less time wandering around the web.
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The ultimate goal of this plan is to better manage the time you spend online. Sometimes we get carried away roaming loosely on the web and we forget about the information that matters to us most. Hopefully this bookmark plan becomes something that you will be able to implement into your daily life.
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