The Joys and Woes of Networking
One of the best things I have gained from blogging have been friendships and contacts. This should have been anticipated but instead still surprises me now. This networking side of blogging and social media is something that has come increasingly to the fore in recent years. I see it both as a good and bad thing.
Right from the start it was the social side of computer communications that drew me in. First the primative Bulletin Board systems over slow, noisy modems, then usenet and of course the rest is history. The point is at that time it was almost exclusively people making friends or helping each other. I took part in geeky discussions both for fun and professionally.
I never really went in for the swapping business cards kind of networking. To this day I am not entirely sure what you are supposed to do with LinkedIn and such. Luckily I haven’t needed to.
Despite my concerns, which I will go into, networking is something I recommend 100%. Networking is incredibly valuable to anyone who wants to get ahead in any kind of online business. We need the opportunities, support and resources other people can provide. Getting to know other bloggers, Twitterers and forum members could be long term the best time investment you can make, and certainly amongst the most fun.
There are two main downsides I see:
- Faux Friendships - There are many people who only think about what they can gain from networking and so go out and “collect useful people”. Exacerbating this problem are all the blog posts, books and magazine articles advising you to connect with influencers. Nobody seems to think about the influencers. How many requests must the top Diggers get each day? How must it feel to be Seth Godin to be barraged with apparent overtures of friendship day in, day out? It is I guess like being wealthy and having to fend off hangers on who just want handouts or to be part of some entourage. It’s worth remembering these are people, not just a route to influence, traffic or the Digg front page.
- Time Wasting Masquerading as Work - Social Networking can be extremely addictive. The more you do the more you want to do. You want to see what people reply to your latest message or you see how far you can get promoted in some points scoring system, how many friends you have, how many replies you get, how many endorsements or testimonials, and so on. The social side of sites can steal many hours and I have seen it happen with geeks and non-geeks alike, from dating sites, to eBay and Flickr.
What are the solutions?
I think the same solution works for both issues; maintain balance.
- Know exactly what you are doing, and why you are doing it
- be helpful,
- be authentic,
- be friendly,
- be honest
- … and treat people how you would want to be treated.
Rather than thinking what you can gain, think more about how you can help and what you have to give.
Think about it, who would you most like to make contact with? A grasping, selfish, demanding, faker or a helpful, friendly, generous, kind, fun person?
I think it is very true that like attracts like, plus many people have a good built in defense mechanism to protect against types who are just out for personal gain.
Be the type of person you would most want to contact!
Have you had any success in networking? How do you approach making new friends and contacts? What can you do about the fakers and takers? Please share your thoughts in the comments ….
Posted on February 15th, 2008 by Chris Garrett in Business
Very true! I often see people saying you have to wear a mask on the business world, that you can’t be yourself, yadda yadda. I personally don’t bite that for a moment.
It is true that there are different kinds of relationships and personal matters shouldn’t interfere in the professional life, but this doesn’t mean not being oneself.
In fact there is only one you and if you are a jerk with either your professional or personal relationships, it doesn’t matter what you do the rest of the time, this affects who you are, and you’d be a jerk.
It is true that the market can be very mean with good hearted people, but being honest and self-preservation don’t collide. Being honest (in a broad meaning) is, IMO, the best business strategy one can have.
Nice one, Chris. Networking has to be done properly and with respect. Using it as a leverage is one thing - abusing it and treating people as rungs on a ladder to get ahead is another.
I’m personally very fortunate to have met and become friends with some great people - because I treated them like people first, and they did the same to me. I think a lot of people these days are forgetting that being a person and respecting others is more important than getting ahead. The means don’t justify the ends.
Chris, I’ve met a lot of great people online–starting back years ago on GEnie, an online bulletin board system accessed through a DOS interface with a “slow noisy modem”. Some of these writer friends are still my blogging friends now.
I recently expanded my focus on my personal blog, which used to be a writing blog, and went out searching for new blogs to comment on, new friends to make. It’s been a wonderful experience. I enjoy the networking aspect of the online community. While I’ve come across the fakers and users over the years, the majority of the people I’ve met online have been genuine and a pleasure to know.
I really enjoyed your growing your blog/stop going in circles post this week too.
@Guilherme - Exactly, I think you have to be true to yourself. Not revealing every hidden secret but knowing that you are always being who you want to be and not putting on an act. People connect more with authenticity and liars and fakers almost always get found out.
@James - Yes and I think the distance of the internet helps people believe that they can get away with poor behavior. Things they would never do in face to face relationships.
@kacey - Like you I have had mostly good experiences, enough that I still feel people are basically honest and good
There have been enough bad experiences though that I am more cautious. It’s still a joy when you make new friends and contacts, I think that is one of the nice things about new services such as Twitter emphasizing discussion 
Thinking more on this, I just want to add that I think people try to be someone they’re not - they want to appear professional, reputable and credible, so they hide who they really are.
The issue with that is that professionals are people, too, and it’s okay to show that you’re a person with personality - and still be professional at the same time.
Absolutely, I have had way more success making contacts when I have accepted I am a flawed human being rather than some perfect automaton
I always want to try networking and believe it can help on your online business. However I’m not the people who try to get know people in order to leverage my business…
I have problem when I want to meet friends and I’m not really good at managing times, seriously in using language, I’m almost near the robotic language… but I believe that if we can be ourselves, others will not think you’re just trying make use of them, human can’t really hide everything and only show the best and good side to everyone…
I’m an aweful networker. I like discussion, but even in real life I’m pretty lame when it comes to being friendly. (I’m usually a total jerk!) I believe it’s a great way to grow your blog though–can’t deny it. Can’t deny the amount of life it sucks from my body either. I try to do what I can, but I can only convince myself to do it if I’m really sincere about what I’m saying or if I’m really passionate about the subject and feel I have something to contribute. Otherwise, I keep my mouth shut; that way, I have less chance of sounding like a complete moron.
Chris,
Just wanted to say how much I enjoy your newsletter - I am amazed that you have time to do this daily article, I am still struggling to build up volume of visitors genuinely [as opposed to some of the tricks that people brag about ]
Being very new to this I realise I have a lot to learn!
Great post Chris, I stumbled it.
I think you have to be very careful about getting caught up in networking. I wrote a post last month about the dangers of social networking. My biggest problem was how time consuming it became.
Obviously, it can be too self serving which is equally bad. I come across many people who do the same thing in person… go into relationships only seeking what’s in it for them. In other words, this isn’t just an online issue.
Great post Chris. Networking (mostly offline) is something that I have doing for years. Most opportunities (jobs, sales, partnerships, etc.) come from relatioship building. While online tools are great for networking, I believe that face to face time is also very important. I use tools like LinkedIn to manage my network after I get to know people in person. LinkedIn is interesting because you can see who is connected to who in your network. You never know when you may need to leverage those relationships. For me, I have met most of my contacts at networking events. For the ones that I connect with and like, I build relationships over the long term through events, newsletters, personal Website, and inviting people to breakfast or lunch. It takes time and discipline but well worth the effort. Many opportunities have presented themselves to me because of networking. Lastly, you need to provide value to people so give them relevant information, connect them to people, and constantly find ways to help.
Chris: I find that online networking is about like any sort of networking, except that the potential coverage is so much larger. That seems to make the good parts better and the undesirable parts more challenging.
As I writer for many years, I have many contacts, from editors and other writers to experts in the fields that I cover as well as PR people who handle companies in the fields that I cover. Some turn into real friends. Others act like real friends until a job ends, and then they hardly know who you are. Others still always keep some distance, no matter who long I work with them.
My approach has always been simple: No matter what is on the table, find a nice way to discuss it. That philosophy does not always get returned, but at least I know that I tried to keep the conversation civil and polite. Of course, I’ve also had times when being civil is not so easy on my end either. So goes the networking balance.
Chris, your post is a timely reminder of just how easy it is to become seduced by the contacts that are non-authentic. Knowing yourself and what makes you tick appears to be one way of being focused on what you want out of networking as well as what you want to contribute to the online communicty. Being authentic is certainly the key, however, for many of us this is difficult as we don’t really know what our authentic self is like. We tend to ‘perform’ in each situation to meet what others expect from us or what we ‘read’ to be the needs of the situation. The way out of this charade is likely to be achieved by using your networking ‘rules’ to become smart in developing genuine relationships.
Networking is what I have spent the past week doing the most I’d say. It has taken up more time then I would have ever thought. I think one of the reasons is because that their are so many different sites that everyone uses it easily becomes overwhelming for me too keep up with it all. Today for example I just got online now and its 10:30PM and I still need to post on my blog, network, bookmark, and also do some of my freelance writing jobs.. It really becomes crazy and I think the networking is so much fun that I spend too much time most days on that aspect instead of getting ahead on future work so I have days like today where I don’t need to pop on at 10:30 to get stuff done.
Hi Chris… your post is very timely for me. The online socializing thing is something I’m trying to get under control as we speak.
I’m in the process of launching another website, a new blog, I have an active marketing group for realtors with 4600+ subscribers and a ton of invites each week to be someone’s “friend” on everything from LinkedIn and Plaxo to Facebook.
I do appreciate and value the networking possibilities since we never know where our next client or marketing partner might come from but… it eats up a lot of time.
I guess most of us working on the net are in the same boat. I’m trying to consolidate everything down to a few major meeting places with links on some of the other social networks pointing people back to my main hubs.
Basically I’m trying to focus on what works best while still making time for a life in the real world. Not easy but…
Nice post Chris,
Networking is a tremendously valuable, yet overlooked business tool. When done correctly, it can be incredibly fruitful.
A golden networking rule to remember is that ‘Networking is a gradual process, not a one time event’.
In our instant gratification society, people tend not to want to put in the time and efforts necessary.
Networking is not like traditional marketing in the sense of hunting for new customers. Conversely, it can be likened to farming.
Just as we need to give the crops water and sunlight, so too must we GIVE to those we network with first, before we can ever expect to bear any fruit prior to a gradual cultivation and trust-building process in the relationship.
Whether it be online or offline networking, the process I believe is very much the same.
Being in recruitment (soon to change responsibilities, can’t wait!), I network quite a lot, actually even more now that I’m working internally than when I was working for a recruitment agency. Sometimes networking has a negative connotation, because of the reasons you’ve explained so i actually don’t even use the term that much, but I see it as you do: first and foremost I’m talking to people and go out intending get something out of it, may it be personal or professional.
The most important one of them being to have a good time, and then be ready to be surprised by what you’re going to learn, whatever it is, it will be useful. As long as you’re interested in talking (and more importantly listening) to the person and forget about your own agenda, you’d be amazed how interesting every single person you meet can be!