Digital detox experiences
As a marcom professional, I am almost always online and my mobile is always in sight. I often go to bed too late, have neck pain when I stare at the phone screen for too long and have difficulty focusing on a conversation when all kinds of app notifications come in. That is why I opted for a digital detox, where I did not have a smartphone with me for a week. My most important findings in a row:
No mobile is relaxing! I go to sleep right away in the evening, because I no longer have a mobile to get lost in. Result: I wake up fit every morning. I also no longer have to check social media every few minutes, update sports activities or fill in my digital food diary.
I am happier without social media, because I don't get impressions of things or people that are happening somewhere else. Apparently those impressions often have a negative influence on my mood.
Google plays a big role in conversations. Surprisingly, these are the only moments during the detox week when I really miss my smartphone. During many of these conversations, I want to quickly google a place, person or video.
336 missed whatsapp messages
With these experiences I return to the hong kong mobile number Netherlands after a week. When I turn my phone back on, the counter of missed social media alerts is at 336 WhatsApp messages, 40 Instagram messages, 14 Facebook messages, 26 Twitter messages and 95 Pinterest messages. None of them are really interesting.
This detox week made me realize that I feel better when I'm not online as much. I try to maintain that feeling by living a little less digitally. I set my phone to not receive app notifications at night, unsubscribe from newsletters that I never open anyway and put my phone out of sight as much as possible. I also look at social media a lot less when I have nothing to do.
If more and more consumers, like me, want to shut themselves off from the unrest and negativity of online and social media, how do we respond to this as online marcom professionals? We are not going back to the Nokia 3310 and we will not have to proclaim our message from a car roof with a megaphone, but the growing number of digital detox providers does show that the need for being offline is increasing.
So we should not blindly focus on the latest online possibilities. The offline trend also confirms that online should not be overestimated. Less than half of the world's population has access to the internet (and that does not only apply to non-Western countries) and companies in the Netherlands spend only 8 percent of their media expenditure online. If consumers are offline more often, that is also the way we can reach them. With the digital-less trend, the demand for alarm clocks, books, board games, notebooks and cameras can also increase again.