The Hotlist Concept – Consume your top content first

There is so much information out there that it is easy to get overwhelmed.  Furthermore, I’m busy as I’m sure you are.  How do you even find the time to sift through everything?  Maybe you follow 4,000 people on Twitter, maybe your RSS reader (Google Reader) is busting at the seams, how do you make sure you’re getting the most out of your content consumption?  Here’s how I manage…create a Hotlist.  The idea is this, seperate out the information sources that you tend to find most valuable.  When you feel like reading just click on your Hotlist Twitter list or RSS Folder.

In Google Reader I created a folder called “Hotlist” and put only the blogs that I don’t want to miss each day.  Blogs like Seth Godin’s Blog, Chris Brogan’s blog, Conversation Agent and Mark Aaron Murnahan’s blog, among others.  I know that when I click on this folder I’m only getting the top sources that I’ve selected.

I created a list on Twitter called “My Influencers.” In that list I collect all of the top people I follow on Twitter.  Out of the 1,400+ Tweeple I follow, only 43 made it into this list.  I start here and when I’ve read through everything new, that’s when I move onto another list.