Connected Well

Social networks are powerful, meaningful tools I have had the opportunity to leverage we ll for personal and professional benefit.  Just last week I was trying to find good camping locations and received several good recommendations.

I have also gone overboard at times with my virtual social life by,  for example, facebooking when I should be playing with my kids, or being glued to twhirl instead of my work.

It’s time to make some changes to who and why I follow/friend/add people to these networks.  In the past, I have allowed LinkedIn to be my most conservative network, but time and life dictates that I need to be much more selective about my other social interactions, too.

So, with a hat tip to Shel, here’s my Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook (“TwinkedInBook”?) follow policy:

• As a general rule, I only add/follow people I actually know. That means we have had some meaningful interaction and that your connection aligns with the things I care about.
• I welcome conversations.  If I have said something you want to comment on, please do, but be real, and open about who you are.  I don’t have to follow you to hear you. This is the Internet. @robertmerrill me, and I will find it.  If you really need to reach me, um, my full name at gmail dot com is a pretty good starting point.
• I get that networking is not just socializing [via @jibberjobber]. I like both, but I am primarilly online for networking in the sense of a professional relationship. I believe  networking is about what you give and get.  I wont follow you if I don’t think I can meaningfully give to you and/or that I can receive from you appropriately as well.  By the way, I still believe the appropriate balance is to GIVE 10x what you RECEIVE in any relationship, but I will not follow you unless you’re providing a relevant, useful and thought-provoking connection.
• If I don’t follow you, or just stopped following you, please don’t be offended. Really. It’s not you. It’s me.
• I will follow companies when I want announcements or information. I will follow people when I see relevance in what you’re talking about.  I will unfollow and/or block both when the conversation becomes you selling something, or regurgitating, or just “@username lol!” -ing all day long.
• The things I say are my opinions and beliefs. Yours are your own. Keep that clear and we will get along just fine
• I reserve the right to change this or update it at any time, or at no time, for any or no reason.

And now begins the purging of the accounts…

api Networking, Social Networking facebook, follow, follow-policy, linkedin, Networking, twitter

I’ve been thinking about what Community means.

I spend a lot of time online (sadly) and I have spent a great deal of time (too much time, actually) developing and building online communities… or so I thoug[ht. In fact, I now believe strongly that you should spend as much as 10x the time you spend making online friends in connecting with real-life humans.  This might be a good reason why.]

To me, I belive there may be a few requirements that make a difference between just “people you know” and “Community”.

1. Investment: People in the community feel ownership, likely because something is on the line if they don’t… like property values, their children’s education, social benefits, etc.
2. Emotional Connection: This means you actually care (or something that approximates human caring).  You can notice this when you can’t be a part of the community, you feel like you’ve missed out.
3. Sacrifice: When someone else in the community needs help, you’re willing to put aside your own self-interest for the benefit of others… because you know they’d do the same for you.

That’s my list… what’s yours?

api Networking, Social Networking, people community, Networking

If you are a business decision maker in Utah County, the Corporate Alliance team is a group of people you need to know.

The Utah County “HUB” is the original, though the company has recently expanded to Salt Lake and possibly to other markets as well.

Corporate Alliance Provo Hub (src: Google Maps)

Excellent Business, Excellent Service, Excellent Location‎

Corporate Alliance is in the business of helping business people succeed by helping them get to know the decision-makers and service providers in their community.

Their (original) Utah County “HUB” is a premium location to meet clients, to take your staff for getaways or staff meetings, and to attend their excellent pools, trainings, and JumpStarts to rejuvenate yourself and meet other incredible business people in your town.

Strongly recommended!

Directions to Corporate Alliance Provo

746 E 1910 S
Provo, UT 84606
(801) 434-8326
corporatealliance.net

View Larger Map

Rahhb Networking business, companies, connected, corporate alliance, events, location, Networking, relationships, utah, utah county

Sharing the things you find as you journey through life is half the fun of being well-connected. And, of course, a picture is worth thousands and thousands of those words. Flickr, the popular online photo storage site, has published a cool uploading tool that allows you to choose and send photos from your blackberry to your account on the Flickr website, but you can also “geotag” photos (adding information to the photo revealing the location it was taken), and even send photos you have already put on Flickr to your Blackberry contacts! From the Blackberry site:

This mobile photo uploader is designed to offer the same features and functions you’re used to using on your computer. And, because of the familiar BlackBerry smartphone keyboard, menus and prompts, it’s easy to learn, fun to use and it’s free. Upload photos easily Snap a picture, put it in the right album, tag it, and even adjust its size. Then post it with just a few quick clicks. Geotag your pictures If you’re using a BlackBerry smartphone with GPS capabilities you can also geotag images so that people who look at your pictures can tell where you uploaded them. Download Flickr Photo Uploader for BlackBerry Smartphones.

Rahhb Tools blackberry, connected, flickr, media, Networking, photo, pictures, sharing, smartphone

I just finished listening to a great podcast (as usual) from Peter Clayton of Total Picture Radio with Shally Steckerl, the guru of LinkedIn gurus.

The cast, called LinkedIn, Reloaded, explores some of the new additional features of LinkedIn since their last redesign. Clayton queries Steckerl about how and why you should connect to people, how to leverage your network in your jobsearching, and compares LinkedIn and other social networks such as plaxo, naymz, ecademy, facebook and one I had not heard of, xing.

One interesting question Shally takes a stab at in a very good way:

How openly do you accept network connections, and why?

Rahhb Social Networking, Tools ecademy, facebook, linked in, naymz, networker, Networking, plaxo, podcast, social network, though leader, total_picture_radio, xing

My initial way to explain BrightKite is that it’s like Twitter (what you’re doing) + Location (Where you’re doing it), which I like. I am trying to determine how to use it (mainly because I use Verizon for my phone service, and it’s currently not supported).

But, I just bumped into it’s Map Friends feature, which shows you where your friends have last “checked in” and how you could find them. (See a screenshot, below of my current friendmap)

This seems to fit well with Brightkite’s vision to enable a social network that helps facilitate real-life friendships as well as virtual ones:

Wouldn’t it be nice to have social community around the locations you frequent? To actually meet new people, not Facebook-to-Myspace, but face-to-face? MySpace has done a really good job of facilitating meaningless cyber friendships with unprecedented ease. Ironically, Facebook does not easily enable face-time with friends at all. At Brightkite we believe tangible community has a place around real-world locations.

My current beefs with the platform will surely be addressed soon:

• Since I use Verizon, I can’t “check in” via mobile messaging yet.
• There’s no Mobile Web version (that would help)… but they’re working on it.
• My brightkite check-ins are reposted to twitter, but I want it the other way around, too (similar to my facebook status updated automagically via the twitter facebook app.
• I want to comment on people’s brightkite postings (ala FriendFeed), and allow comments on mine.

But I will say overall that my favorite, clear usage for this app at the moment is that it really does help you transcend just what people are DOING, and the conversation (which twitter does so well) and mash that up with actually understanding where people ARE, and what they are doing there.

If BrightKite doesn’t work for you, maybe you need one of these kittehs, instead:

Rahhb Social Networking brightkite, facebook, friends, geotagging, GPS, in_real_life, IRL, location, mobile, mobile web, Networking, real life, Social Networking, socialnetworks, socnets, status, twitter, verizon, when, where

The other day I was co-working near someone I had seen before but never met, and who was browsing their LinkedIn profile with the tenacity of an archaeologist.

[I try to be careful with my linking and networking, working hard not to take up time with it I should be doing other things. For example, the fact that I can send invitations via LinkedIn Mobile really speeds things up for me!]

He leaned over after a few minutes and said to me:

Him: Are you on LinkedIn?

Me: Yes. Great tool, huh?

Him: Yes, I love it… its a great way to get to know more people.

We introduced each other and talked cordially for a moment, then he went in for the kill:

Him: So… do you mind if I link to you?

Me: No, not at all…

Him: Awesome. I will send you an invitation…
(pause while he typed in my information)
…see, it’s my goal to become one of those people who has 500+ connections on there. THOSE ARE THE POWER NETWORKERS…

Me: (silence, and a little dumbfounded that I’ve just been suckered into his network)

Him: (sensing my dumbfoundedness) Yo-you don’t agree?…

Me: I just think you can do more with a small network of people who TRUST and KNOW you than you ever could with a huge network of people who really have no idea who you are.

Him: (…. thinking now….) … what do you mean?

Me: I mean, I have worked very hard to build my network of trusted associates carefully. My LinkedIn network, for example, is completely made up of people I have had some kind of meaningful connection or communication with. I know I can ask those people for real help or real assistance and they will reply to me because they actually know me.

Him: (…. still thinking….) … well, sure… I can see your point…. but I still think it would be cool to just, you know, be “connected to everybody”. I guess we just have different reasons for networking.

Me: Well, I guess we do.

We went on about our business and, a few minutes later, as I was leaving to go to a meeting, he caught up with me:

Him: Hey, man! You have 447 connections! Woah! There’s no way you actually know all those people!

Me: Well, I didn’t say I started networking yesterday… and… I actually know you, don’t I?

Rahhb Networking, Social Networking connections, coworking, influence, linkedin, Networking, people, people you know, philosophy, Social Networking, trust