How can anyone keep up with all that information?

I hear this from colleagues all the time, how do you keep on top of so much news? How have are you always the first person to know this thing?

Keeping on top of trends, of regulatory changes, of new event is critical. This is a big part of content, and from that we bring context. It is part of what makes us Subject Matter Experts.

But let’s be honest, there is a lot out there to stay aware of, and it can eat a lot of unproductive hours up, especially with so much new content on the web being added daily, it can be tough to keep up with what’s happening online. But if you rely on visiting specific websites every day, doing Google searches, or relying on social media to keep them informed you will get overwhelmed and miss important things. The best solution I have found is pretty old-school: The RSS feed.

About every site you need to follow, from a trade publication to a government agency to a professional society to all those blogs publishes an RSS feed (including this one). Often they publish more than one which can compartmentalize the reading and help you narrow down to specific topics that interest you.

You then use a reader to aggregate these feeds into compartments that make sense to you, skim the headlines at your leisure and read those items that seem relevant to you. This gives you a comprehensive, regularly updated look at all the content your favorite sites publish throughout the day. Think of it as the ultimate aggregator; every morsel from every source you care about, fed directly to you.

I use Feedly, but there are several good ones out there, most free to use. A lot of friends tell me I should move to Inoreader.

Do not be afraid of the massive amounts of information out there. Like anything, it’s all about getting the right tool for the job.