I asked for and received advice from my contacts. I’d like to share some of that advice. Enjoy.
Geekmommy Remember: sometimes it’s more important to fix what’s wrong than it is to be right. You might be right as rain – but if you damage a relationship to prove it? You lose.
BlondeByDesign For ea person, what’s impt to develop their lives/themselves to their very best is diff. Being real, self love = BIGGEST asssets
BlondeByDesign Don’t try to be or act important. An honest & humble heart will tell the story anyone else needs to see.
gloriabell Live everyday like tomorrow will be your last and you don’t want to die alone or with regrets.
lizstrauss Keep the promises you’ve already made to yourself.
Lindsay Donaghe My #1 life rule: Before taking any action, think through and be willing to accept the consequences, good and bad. Try to decide before-hand what you would do in situations and why and then follow-through on that when the situations arise. Don’t stumble through life. Accept personal responsibility. You will make a bad decision from time to time, but be willing to own up to it, learn from it and fix it.
techmate No big deal if a magazine falls in a toilet
Rahsheen Porter If you forget that it’s not all about you, you will never reach your goals. Each person you meet is a golden link in your chain of success
You’ve just written a world saving blog post or book or both. It’s got to reach the world in short order. How are you going to convince your friends to talk about it to their connections and networks? Is bribery the answer? Offer them some participation prizes? We know that only provides temporary buzz.
It’s war out there. People in your network of friends and business associates are under a constant barrage of information. They’ve seen dozens of blog posts, new books, and freshly launched businesses. Chances are they are weary of it all. What’s a person to do?
Contacts need to become comrades in arms. Their energy and focus on your needs to be such that’d they are willing to help you put the war paint on. When that happens, they’ll be talking up you, your work and more without any prompting.
War paint? Yep. What I found out when working to get to SOBCon08 was more was accomplished by getting folks along side than pushing them to push others. Oh, I did my share of that, but what really worked was bringing my contacts to fight along side for me.
How to get them there is really the question? It’s partially about having something great to say, but it’s equally about sharing your story and making them a part of it.
What really sells people, especially folks like me, is getting involved in the story. What gets me talking about Apple and their products? Oh, good products for sure, but there are lots of good to great products out there. For me it’s the story. I can tell about my Mac conversion; I can talk about how excited Apple is about the users; I can’t help myself.
With my contacts, it’s hard not to share their stories when they share them with me and invite me to be involved. That’s crucial. You can’t just have a story to tell, but it’s got to be one that folks can join in on.
Cancer survivor stories might move us, but how much more moving when told by someone that you know, or someone that asks you to come along side, and lets you know how much it’s appreciated. A story where you get to be part of it.
If you’re paying attention, you’ll realize it’s not really about the book, or the blog post so much. It’s about who you are and how your contacts are part of that. The more involved you can help them to be, the more they are going to want to share on their own.
Honesty and transparency are key. If you’re going to ask folks to get involved, and give you their trust, get them to be part of and share our story, then be up front with them. Ask for their help, tell them the truth, and share the joy of your success.
Do you have cohorts willing to help you put the war paint on and face the world? Are you working on building those types of relationships? Waiting for your best seller to happen? How about getting your support team together while you wait. They are vital to your success.
Want to come along side me? Your support and encouragement is always welcome. Want me along side for you? Tell me your story and get me on board. We’ll go face the world together.
Social networking and media can fool you. Oh yeah, you’ve got a hundred contacts here, a 1000 there, and more folks are friending you on Facebook every day.
But what’s really happening? Is the world knocking your door down? Are these folks really your friends? The hard truth is that most of these folks will engage you in no more than water cooler chat.
Reality can be rough, but this isn’t out of your control. There’s hope and better relationships ahead. We just have to step off the path a bit.
What can you do? How can you turn contacts into partners, associates, and friends? Investment!
The biggest mistake we make is looking for more when we’re not willing to take the first step. As in relationships of any kind, it takes time and effort to form a bond. This is amplified in some ways by the sheer distances across which we reach with the internet.
Investment isn’t about spending more money, or taking out stock in a the latest Facebook copy cat. It’s about investing in those threadbare connections. Turn the water cooler chat into sharing about plans, dreams, and that secret tattoo.
As a person struggling with this every day, and feeling the pressure myself, I’ve set myself on a path to move through this struggle. There are a few things I’ve done to move things forward.
- send postcards – folks really enjoy these, and they give you a chance to send a hand written and personal note to someone, an individual, across miles, and even across oceans. This is the personal touch that gets remembered and says, “I like you.”
- ask how you can support them – I find myself more and more asking how I can support people. Yes, I fail sometimes, but I’m getting better. But it’s about the effort. Get in there and actually support folks. Don’t just cheer on the sidelines! Visit their blog, link to them, send your friends to their site, pimp out their book, or even consider praying for them.
- pick up the phone – if you can’t be there, the next best thing is a human voice. I’ve witnessed first hand how life changing a single phone call can be. It doesn’t have to be a heavy thing, but reach out, touch someone’s life today. You can’t do business either until you connect.
- when all else fails, visit in person – I’d taken the opportunity this year to do just that. I’ve to meetups, lunches, breakfasts, and dinners, blogger meetings, tweetups, and taken photo walks. Heck, we even stayed at a Flickr friend’s house for a week. Wow!
I’m no genius and these aren’t brain surgery level tips. These are simple and practical things you can start doing today.
To show you I’m serious, email me, DM me, send me a private Utterz, call. Tell me about yourself, how we can connect, and where you’re looking for support. Beyond that, I challenge you to reach out today to one of those people you’ve got in your contact list and let them know you’re more than an avatar.
You’ve joined Facebook, Twitter, and have a blog; your contacts have grown from your next door neighbors, coworkers and school friends to folks all over your country and beyond and now one of them wants to send you a postcard.
Receiving a postcard seems like such a small thing, and relatively safe. Your friend seems nice; they are the like you in many ways, except they live 2000 miles away. But then you start remembering the stories.
Stalkers and other creepy types abound on the Internet. Molesters showing up at homes; spammers flooding mailboxes; undesired materials showing up at people’s door steps. You don’t want any part of that.
What’s a digital world person to do then?
I’ll let you hear the voice of Twitter.
You can see where this is headed. Giving out a real address is not considered good advice. The alternative? Business or PO Box.
Luckily, if you live in the US, the US Postal Service provides PO Boxes. You can read about that service here. Similar services are also available privately.
This discussion has sealed the deal for me. I’ll be PO Box shopping next week. How about you?
What will you do when you’re ready to get that postcard from Timbuktoo?
Austin made me feel welcome in more ways than one. Heck, they even named a store after my son, Randall’s. Throughout the week folks were courteous and welcoming.
That and they kept apologizing for the weather. Yes, when it’s below 70 something or the least bit clowdy, they think the weather is bad. Heck, it was flooding in our neck of the woods when we left and cold too boot.
Austin brought Nanna J and I opportunities for dining experiences, cultural discoveries, and making new friends. Simis, a photographer friend, hosted us for the entire week. My favorite shot of her.
During our visit were were able to not just meet with Simis, but with several other contacts of mine from Twitter. We had lunch out with @Orchid8.
We had breakfast with @mikeneumann:
Dinner with Simis:
And then a whole dang tweetup hosted by Kim Haynes.
Several folks turned out for the meetup and made us feel quite welcome. We didn’t just talk about Twitter either. No, we talked about blogging, social media, photography, and social networking. But beyond that, we had opportunity to talk about each other, Austin, and food. You know that last one is dear to my heart. Ha.
As you can see, just meeting folks was a busy week. I’ll have to do another post about the cultural stuff I guess. Expect a post just about the food as well.
For a visual recap of our week in Austin be sure to check out Flickr. I’ll be adding more pics to that set over the next several days.
In summary, the trip to Austin brought me closer to folks in my network than just being virtual friends. We talked, we laughed, and we broke bread together. Those are the makings of a lasting friendship. Heck, in all the excitement, I made some new friends too and so did our friend Simis.
What are you doing with your next vacation? Seeing the Grand Canyon, or closing the loop with friends? Can you manage both like in our Austin trip?
When you look at this chart from the Twitter blog, just where do you find yourself? More than 90 followers – check. More than 90 you follow – check. Hmm. Top 10% on both? Does that put you in the top 1% then of all Twitter users?
But your not alone. Recent numbers are rumored to be approaching 1 million for Twitter users. 1% of 1,000,000 is about 10,000 users. Woah.
So maybe you’re not totally alone. For a good bit of you, I’m willing to be you have more Twitter contacts than family, friends, and coworkers put together. (Discounting overlap of such with Twitter of course.)
What’s a guy or gal to do with this bit of trivia? Nothing, I say! Just take it in stride and know that soon enough your boss, your mother, and that strange cousin with a crush on you will all be on Twitter, and your tweets about hot buns and etc might just have to be cut back on.
Hey, wait, was that new Twitter follower my nephew? Now how to explain about Stripper Fridays.
So I’m going today to the 1st meeting of Social Media Club St. Louis and I’m wondering if I should. Oh, not because it won’t be fun, or constructive, and not because I won’t make new contacts, but for just the opposite. I’m worried about making too many new contacts.
That’s right, too many. I’m quickly facing the point in my social networking and media relationships cycle where there are just too many folks to keep up with. Contacts galore, but you say, how many of them do you pay attention to. Too many and not enough.
I’m now following hundreds of contacts on Twitter, some on Utterz, and countless blogs via RSS. That’s not to mention messages and interaction on Facebook and other smaller spots. And today’s meetup is bound to bring me more cool folks to follow and interact with.
So what’s a guy to do? I’ve already talked about social networking contact issues here, here, and here. Still my conclusion is the cliche, less is more. How am I accomplishing this?
There isn’t really one answer for me, but here’s how I’m going to handle it today.
1) Give folks my almost universal ID – tojosan – good for Twitter, Utterz, and more social networking and media sites.
2) Give folks my blog information
3) Accept and note down their universal IDs and add them as contacts
4) Get their blog information – and subscribe on a trial basis
My expectations?
1) Two or three out of a dozen plus will become regular contacts
2) Two or three will have blogs of real interest to me
How do I feel about that? Just fine. Honestly, more of them would just be attention thieves from the others. Will I stop following the blogs? Maybe not, but they’ll be relegated to the weekly vs daily checks for sure. Since they are local, it might be hard to pass them up. The key criteria will be subject matter though. I’m very uninterested in political ranting, and much more interested in articles about restaurants, tech, and movies.
Will you be screening your new potential contacts? Or will you just keep adding anyone that you meet? Is it exclusionary to put off making contacts of folks that you aren’t interested in, if they are interested in following you? What’s your plan for your next meetup?
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