10 Social Media-related Verbs

Learn 10 social media-related verbs

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Lesson Transcript

Hi everybody and welcome back to Top Words! My name is Alisha, and today, we're gonna be talking about 10 social media-related verbs. So, let's get into it!

1. post

The first verb is "post," post. So, to post something means to upload something to the internet, to upload something to a social media website like Facebook or Twitter or Instagram, for example. You can say, "to post to Twitter / to post to Facebook / to post to Instagram / to post to Snapchat / to post to Tumblr." Uploading your content, uploading text or images to a social media service is posting something, to post something.

So, in a sentence…

"I post pictures on Instagram every day."

That's not true.

Or…

"I post information on Facebook every week."

That's not necessarily true, either.

In this sentence…

"I post on Instagram once a week or so."

2. add (as a friend) / follow

Okay, the next verb is "add (as a friend) / follow." So we use, "to add / to follow (someone)" to mean to… to include them in our friend group or to follow their updates on social media in some way. So on Twitter, for example, we use "follow" a lot, to follow someone on Twitter. On Facebook, we can say, to add someone as a friend or to add someone on Instagram, for example. We can use "follow" on Instagram as well.

Basically, these two words are interchangeable. You can use them in the same way, but…,I don't know, it's up to you, it's up to you, really.

So, in a few sentences… let's see…

"I follow some really interesting people on Twitter."

"I follow a lot of friends on Instagram."

"Do you follow me on Twitter?"

"Why didn't you follow me on Facebook?"

I don't know, something like this.

In this sentence…

"She added me as a friend at the party."

Or, in another sentence…

"I don't follow him on Twitter."

Okay.

3. unfriend

All right, the next verb is "unfriend," to unfriend. So to unfriend someone is to remove them from your friend's list. So we can unfriend someone or you might also hear the word "defriend (someone)," to unfriend or to defriend.

And… let's see, there is one other word that we sometimes use which is, "unfollow" as well. So we have unfriend, defriend, and unfollow. These all mean to stop receiving updates from someone, to stop receiving news, to stop receiving texts or pictures on social media from someone.

So, in the example sentences… let's see…

"My ex-boyfriend unfriended me on Facebook."

"I unfollowed that really annoying person."

"Why did you unfollow me?"

Or, in this sentence…

"He updates way too often; I'm gonna unfriend him."

4. tweet

The next verb is "tweet," to tweet, to tweet. We use the verb tweet. So tweet, originally, is associated with the sound that birds make; a tweeting sound. But now, we use the verb "to tweet" as well to talk about posting short messages only on Twitter. We don't use "tweet" for Facebook, or for Instagram, or other services, "tweet" is only for Twitter. So, we can use it in a sentence like…

"I tweet many times a day."

"I tweet a few times a week."

"He tweets way too often."

"You never tweet anything interesting."

In this sentence…

"How often do you tweet?"

5. use a filter

The next verb is "use a filter," to use a filter. This is a verb or a phrase that's applicable... that we can use on Instagram. So in Instagram, when you upload a picture, you can choose from what are called filters on Instagram. They make your picture look a little bit different. Each filter creates a different view or a different look for your picture.

So "to use a filter," this is the verb that we use to talk about applying that filter, to talk about that filter on your picture.

So, in sentences, you could say…

"I never use a filter on Instagram."

"What filter do you like to use on Instagram?"

"Have you ever used this filter?"

"I hate that filter that you used."

For example

In this sentence…

"I think she uses a filter for every post on Instagram."

6. repost

Next one, the next verb is "repost," repost, to repost. We've talked about the prefix RE- before. So RE- means "do again." So RE- + a verb means do the verb again. So repost, we talked about post at the beginning of this video. RE- means do it again. So someone's post, we share that post, to post again. So reposting is something you do on, for example, Facebook or maybe, Instagram. You share someone else's content again. So, your friend posted a really interesting image on Instagram, there might be an application you can use to repost that image.

So, in… let's see, example sentences…

"I never repost anything on Instagram."

Or, let's see…

"My friend reposted a really interesting photo."

In this sentence…

"Do you know how to repost something on Instagram?"

7. retweet

The next verb is "retweet," retweet. So, just as we talked about with repost, we have the same thing here with tweet. Retweet means "tweet again." But this verb is only used for Twitter. Twitter can be used to retweet, meaning to share someone else's idea, someone else's tweet. There's a retweet button on Twitter that you can use to share someone else's tweet.

So, let's see, in example sentences…

"I hate it when people retweet a lot of things in a row."

That's true. Let's see…

"I only retweet things that I think are interesting."

"I try to retweet things that are funny."

In this sentence…

"This tweet was retweeted by a lot of people."

That's really hard to say. This tweet was retweeted, this tweet, tret… uh! This tweet was retweeted by a lot of people. I can remember that. What is that?

8. make private

Okay, the next verb is "make private," make private. So, to make something private means you lock the account or the account is not visible. Other people cannot see the account. To make something private, if you want your social media use to be private, only to people you know, for example; close friends or close family, or maybe you only want to use, let's see, a social media for work, you can make a private social media account.

So, example sentences could be like…

"I decided to make my account private."

"I want to make my account private, so only my friends can see."

In this sentence…

"I made my account private."

9. delete

So the next verb is "delete," delete, so to delete. When you want to delete something from a social media feed, so delete something from Facebook, delete from Instagram, delete from Twitter, there's a special… there's delete button for each post, I think. So, some people choose to delete something after they've posted it.

So, examples could be, let's see…

"I made a typo in a tweet, so I deleted it."

"I was really embarrassed about that photo, so I asked my friend to delete it."

"I accidentally shared something this morning on Facebook, so I deleted it this afternoon."

In this post… post! In this sentence…

"I decided to delete a tweet."

Delete a tweet.

10. share

Next one, the next verb is "share," share, so to share (something). I talked about the verbs repost and retweet, so those are used on like Instagram and on Twitter, but to share something, share something, this is one you can use really on any website or in any sort of internet communication. It's not a verb we only use for one specific type of social media. So, if you're reading a blog, for example, you like, there are often buttons to share the blog post at the bottom of the post. You could click share and choose the method you would like to use to share that information. So generally, sharing is caring, or rather, people are happy when you share their content.