Collecting ‘friends’ and such

People who know me have said on more than one occasion: “he can talk for England on a good day and Ireland on a very good day”

Read into that what you will but I am happy with what I do and the company I keep, not only in business but in the ‘real world’.

But social media makes that a bit fuzzy round the edges.

I get a lot of requests to be someone’s ‘friend’ or to link with them on LinkedIn or to follow them on Twitter – as we all do.  This is where it goes wrong for me.

There are some people that I recognise straight away: relatives, people who I have just done stuff with, or did a deal or impressed me at a networking ‘thing’ – all that but the ones that come out of the blue are another thing altogether.

Don’t know about you but I tend to think about the name, and if it takes me longer than a few seconds – do I want to connect to them if they haven’t made enough of an impression that I forgot their name?

Then there are the ‘collectors’.

Don’t know how or why I come on their radar but I get all sorts of requests from people who I know not.  If I have some time, I will do a little digging on them and  most of them come to a dead end or take me to a place I don’t want  to be ( you know what I am saying?)

And while I am on, why should I collect 9000 twitter followers who do not know me or will not be interested in what I say / do?  A bit of megalomania for web geeks or just a pampering of your own ego?

 

I would much rather have 50 people who know me and follow my rambling on the various social sites, not forgetting of course people who may not know me but get involved with events and things I organise. 

I know this type of thinking may well keep my numbers down and not get me into the type of following that the GA GA’s of this world get but does she follow them? Does she take an interest in what followers have to say?  She might, she might not and I only use her as an example, I could have used 100 other celebs / c-lister who encourage people to ‘follow them’ or ‘friend them’ for just the tick in the box.

So if you want to follow me / friend me / linkedIn me please do so and I will get in touch – or not!

Happy Days