All book and no face? 5 tips to get personal

By on December 3rd, 2009 In Best Practices

I love social media but sometimes I feel it’s a little too impersonal. It’s becoming a communication commodity. A friend organizer instead of a friend connector. Sharing is caring, but as a broadcast? Not so much. Such a modern convenience sometimes makes us forget the real world aspects of human relationships. After all, what good are dozens of “friends” if you never connect with them in real life?

If you find yourself becoming all book and no face, here are five ideas to keep it custom and personal for your best social and professional contacts:

Status update by phone. Having a thought? Who is most likely to care? Call that friend and tell them.  Better yet, ask what they’re doing.  If you’re in the office, get up and go visit with them.

Instead of texting, call. Look, you’re holding the phone anyway.  Just make the call. Texting is impersonal — and at it’s heart, it’s a coward’s medium. Many text to avoid, not to connect. Short conversation and short attention span should not always be mutually exclusive. You get so much more mileage out of a conversation or even a friendly voice mail. And, it’s quicker than typing on the baby teeth keys.

Write a letter by hand. When was the last time you got something special via snail mail? It’s a lost art and so scarcely seen today that it’s even more appreciated. In fact, I bet if you sent a handwritten PR pitch today it would get attention. (Better yet, try a hand written love letter to your significant other and see what happens).

Print or cut out a news article and mail it with a little note. Same idea. Once in awhile, instead of tweeting your many followers, personalize your intellectual finds to the people who are most interested. It’s thoughtful. They’ll appreciate it more — and actually read it. And you don’t chance them missing your posts when it comes across their feeds.

Meet in person once in awhile. Face to face contact is the most valuable form of communication. Do it. Often. Facebook friendship is fleeting. Most add the friend, leave a note or two and move on. Tweets are gone in 60 seconds. Real life conversations replete with actual listening, facial expressions, voice inflections and hand gestures cement real relationships. You get a true sense of a person and some continuity of the relationship. Powerful stuff.

Comments

Matthew Dutile Says:
December 3rd, 2009 at 9:42 am

Great post Dan! Social media is an incredible way to connect with individuals we might have never had any contact with before, but my goal with it is almost always to establish a personal real-life connection. The friends I really talk with on FB and other places are the ones I spend the most time with outside of social networks. I can’t do the tweeting or messaging back and forth thing for 3-4 hours unless a big distance is involved. Why not just meet instead?!

Linda Capcara Says:
December 3rd, 2009 at 10:41 am

I’ve spent way too long hunkered down at my computer, keeping my nose to the grindstone. I’ve recently revived my networking skills and I’m getting out to events a lot more. I must say, I’m having the time of my life! I even won a pair of Sun Devil Cool Tennis shoes this week. I became a professional communicator because I loved people. That’s what it’s all about for me.

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