Category Archives: Communication

Making Friends With Strangers

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For work, often I’ve found myself going to a conference, party or local user group event where I don’t know anyone there and my goal by the end of the event is to know everyone.  The whole process has definitely forced me to think about how we connect with one another.

Ultimately,  when you’re going to make friends with a stranger (aka someone you don’t know), you must have something that you can connect over.    You have to have something that’s going to be the springboard for the longer conversation and hopefully a relationship.

From what I’ve seen those things you connect over can be broken out into 3 types. (I’m sure there are others.  This is just what I could come up with)…

  • A Present Object
  • Shared Interest
  • Shared Present Circumstance

A Present Object

About 8-10 months ago,  I got an Amazon Kindle, which has quickly become one of my favorite things.  I take it everywhere.  I’ll be reading it on the subway on the way to work.  I’ll take it to the coffee shop to read the newspaper on Saturday and Sunday morning.

Early on, the device was more out of the ordinary, so that just about every time I’d take it out some random person would come up to me and start chatting about it.   Ultimately, we’d end up talking about something else but the Kindle was the launching pad.  From the Kindle, you find out what kind books she’s interested in and you’re now making an even deeper connection.

I remember also when Apple computers were less common.  I’d be on my Apple laptop in the airport and I’d see someone else with an Apple laptop.  We’d look up and give each other the customary head nod out of respect.   We were both a member of the Apple family.  From their, it’d be easy to jump into a conversation about experiences with Apple.

It work’s the same with other things.  I’m a big fan of the t-shirt company Threadless.  Whenever I see someone who’s wearing one of their shirts, it’s an instant conversation starter.  How can you not start chatting about the t-shirt “Everyone Poops“?

You just have to find that thing in front of you that you can connect over.

Shared Interest

As I mentioned earlier, I go to a lot of tech conferences and developer oriented user groups, which makes meeting just about anyone that much easier.   When you walk into the room,  you instantly know that you have something in common with everyone in the room.  You can ask someone “So, how long have you been a developer?” or “So, what kind of tech startup are you at?”

Another example, recently a friend of mine invited us to her birthday party.  She invited a number of friends from church but also a number of her friends from work.   These two groups of friends didn’t really know each other.   When I met one of the friends that I didn’t know, my natural question was, “So how do you know her?”  This springs into a conversation.  The shared interest is that of the host, who’s throwing the birthday party.

The shared interest that has brought you together is a way that you can spring into a conversation.

Shared Present Circumstance

Once, I was on the subway on my way home from work.  For whatever reason (I think something happened to a train in front of us), we weren’t moving.    We sat there for what felt like forever.

A row or two in front of me.  I used this shared experience we were having, being stuck on a train that was going no where, to relate and connect.   It probably started with me saying something like “Wow, doesn’t this suck,” referring to the being stuck on the train.   Before you knew it, we were having a conversation.

Ever have a conversation that shifted into awkward and you were fishing for something to connect over?  What shared present circumstance is tried and true that you always reach for?  It’s the weather.  “Wow, the  weather has been great lately” or “Wow, doesn’t this weather suck.”

I have fond memories of the day that I stood in line to get the first generation iPhone.  We were there for three or four hours before we were able to actually get into the store.   By that time, I felt like I was family with my line mates.  We had bonded over the circumstance of waiting in line.  We started talking about our interest in Apple and what kind of tech jobs we had.   I’m actually still friends with some of the folks that I met in that line.

The key is identifying something that you’re both experiencing right now.

Social Object Theory…

My ideas around making friends with strangers really isn’t anything new.  It’s just a way of looking at Social Object Theory.  According to the theory, people don’t connect with people person to person.  They connect with people person to object to person.  That object you’re connecting over can be the things like… present objects (things), shared interests, or present circumstances…  Yep.

So… hopefully this is helpful.  I’m talking about this kind of stuff with Daniel Odio from PointAbout for Digital Capital Week in June 2010 in DC.

What do you think?  Agree? Disagree? I could have EASILY written a ton more examples.  Do you have some?  Are there categories that I’m missing?

What Online Publishers Can Learn From Apple No Longer Attending MacWorld

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Today, Apple fanatics from around the world all cried a little bit in unison when they heard the news that this will be Apple’s last year at the MacWorld Expo in San Francisco and that this year Father Steve Jobs won’t be giving the keynote.

Despite being an Apple fanboy, I think there is actually a pretty cool thing going on.  Check out this section of the press release:

Apple is reaching more people in more ways than ever before, so like many companies, trade shows have become a very minor part of how Apple reaches its customers. The increasing popularity of Apple’s Retail Stores, which more than 3.5 million people visit every week, and the Apple.com website enable Apple to directly reach more than a hundred million customers around the world in innovative new ways.

Apple is making the decision to move away from the mass market approaches to getting messages into the hands of customers.  They’re opting for the mediums that allow them to go directly to their users, the Web and their retail stores.

Just like Apple, you too can move away from the fire hose broadcast style messaging via mass media and start utilizing the Web and social media as a medium for having a relationship and building community directly with your users.

Obviously, we can not all start retail stores like Apple so that we can have face to face relationships with our customers  but a lot of us can spend more money on travel.  We can attend the conferences, meetups, and users groups that our users spend their time at.

I read the paper edition of the Washington Post.  Today someone purchased two full pages of the paper for an advertisement.  I don’t want to know how much that cost.  Regardless, those days are over.   Much like the massive keynotes at trade shows,  that style of getting your message to your users isn’t cost effective of efficient.

So… what are you doing to have a relationship directly with your user community?

Taking Feedback…

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Over the last few weeks, feels like more and more I’ve been getting these unfriendly responses for commenting and contributing to the conversation within a blog or community.

It’s not like I was being nasty.  It was me adding to the conversation and me giving constructive feedback. (I was telling an author that I thought her post was confusing.)  Yet, I got comments that made it sound like they didn’t care or I wasn’t welcome.  It made me not want to participate in their communities.

During my time as a community manager, my experience has been that one of your biggest responsibilities is to listen. Even when you get feedback or comments that you may not agree with, just shut up and listen.

Some how something caused your user to have the perception which brought about the comment.  Don’t you wanna know what got them there?  That’s how you’re going to figure out how to make your product better.

If you’re not getting feedback, well you have an entirely different problem.  You need to find and spend more time amongst your community.  You need to make yourself A LOT more available so that people can reach you and tell you what they’re thinking.

Your users are the life blood of your community.  You want to treat them like you’d treat guests in your house.  Otherwise, like me, they’re going to make their way to the exits and not come back.   One of the benefits of the Web 2.0 era we live in is that there are lots of places I could spend my time.

Let Your Users Share Their Activity On Your Web App Via Facebook

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It seems like Facebook is all that marketers talk about these days. Ever since Facebook launched their platform, people have been trying to figure out what the secret equation is to make an application that will extend their brand. I don’t know about you but I can’t take any more poking, slapping, shooting, beer passing, zombie biting applications.

The Facebook apps have that been my favorites are the ones that allow me to share my activity from other Web apps into Facebook and over the social graph. For example, I love the Pandora Facebook App. It allows my friends to see what Pandora radio stations I have created and I can see theirs.

Pandora's Facebook App

Other apps that do this within Facebook are Upcoming for events, WordPress with blog posts, Twitter with status updates, del.icio.us with bookmarks, Digg with dugg news stories, and many more.

A users activity inside of your applications is very silo’d. No one else gets to see it. But you really do want a users to be able to show their friends what they’re doing with you’re applications. That way things can be more viral.

You want the first user to go about his/her business with your Web app. Within Facebook, people will see what they’re doing with your app. Hopefully your user’s friends will start using it and their friends will start using it.  You’ll be sharing your content without having to actually share it explicitly.
The Web is so big. People want to be able to use their friends as a filter for what they should and shouldn’t check out in life in and out of the Web. Why not provide them with the most information possible?

The DC Tech Community is Alive and Active

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I have to say that the DC Tech Community is alive and active.  I have been meeting so many great people who share similar interest to me.  It’s a fun time to live in the Washington DC area.

Here’s a recap of the last week and a half….

Will Meyer talks Widgets at Refresh DC

Last Week, Clearpsring‘s Will Meyer talked to a packed house of 100+ people at RefreshDC.   Widgets are something that a lot of folks had heard about but i’m not sure how much they’d actually worked with.  This high level overview and discussion was great.

This  Refresh DC was also one of the first major events since BarCamp DC, so there was a lot of the same excitement.

CopyNight DC bring good beer and great discussion about the state of online music

This was my first time attending CopyNight DC,  which is hosted by Joseph Price.  They met at Regional Food & Drink in Chinatown, which has a GREAT beer selection.   What was even better was the discussion.  We got into an impromptu discussion about the state of the online music industry.    With the Amazon MP3 music store just recently coming out, this was one all of our minds.  I really enjoyed it, met some great people, and will be coming back next time.

NextDC Happy Hour Tonight (I’m Bummed I Missed It)

Moses McCall’s group NextDC hosted their very first happy hour tonight.  Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to make it.  I’m sure it was a great time and I’ll see photos of it on Flickr tomorrow.

DC Tech Network is almost at 100 members

A few weeks a go I had the bright idea of using a Ning social network as a way for the DC Tech community to stay better in touch with one another… so I created the DC Technology Network.  I’m pleased to say that we’ve just signed up our 90th member.  The network is getting more and more active everyday.  We’re even working our own book group from the network.

Oh… and there’s more.

There is so much that’s happening in the DC tech community.  It’s exciting.  I hope to share more soon.

If Facebook Just Wastes Time, Can’t It Be Easily Replaced?

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There is an interesting thread in the blogosphere about how Facebook might just be a gigantic way to be unproductive.  Web standards luminary  Jeffrey Zeldman and even Facebook app consultant/self-proclaimed Facebook addict Nick O’Neill have  admitted to its unproductive qualities.

The question I ask is… if the best thing Facebook has going for it is its ability to help you waste time really well, can’t it be easily replaced or won’t it slowly die out?  How can this be a long term viable platform?

Some other Web application or social network is going to help you waste time in an even more fun way and people will flood to that, in the same way that people are moving away from MySpace to Facebook.

At TechCrunch40, everyone got super excited when Mark Zuckerberg announced the new venture fund they’d be starting to spur on the growth of Facebook applications.   They have apparently set away $10 million for this.  I guess this means I can apply to get $25k to build the next generation in Zombie biting Facebook applications.

Please, someone build me a Facebook applications that blows my mind.  Build me an application that really takes advantage of the social graph in an meaningful way.   Show me how you use it in a way that is beneficial to your day to day.

I like Facebook Events but I’d rather use Upcoming or Evite because its not as restrictive.   I like Facebook Photos but I like Flickr better because everyone can see it.  Facebook Video is great but I don’t use it that much.

I need more.

Can You Live A Week Without Facebook?

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I have been really busy lately. Work has had my que loaded pretty non-stop. When I’m not working, I’m getting ready to move into the city, organizing conferences, and hanging out with friends. It’d be incredibly easy for me to go a week without using Facebook.

I’ve been thinking about, talking about, and writing about Facebook and I’m still not really sure what extraordinary thing it does.

Facebook is the place where I find out whats up with my friend from third grade who I haven’t talked with in 10 years. Facebook is where I get bitten by the Zombie application from the person who I met at a conference but haven’t talked to since. Facebook is where my friends join groups which do absolutely nothing.

I challenge all of you who read this to not use Facebook for a week. See if you can live without it. I bet you can.

If you can’t live with out it, tell me why. Like Robert Scoble, has it become your address book? Do you have 5000 friends you have to keep track of?

Also… I challenge my friend Nick O’Neill to live without Facebook for a week or to write me a post convincing me why he can’t live without it (and the reason can’t be that its the center of his business.)

Facebook Video Makes Video Too Easy; Video Messages vs E-Mail

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Facebook Video

So to continue the conversation on Facebook, I thought I’d write about one of my favorite applications, Facebook Video. (I don’t want people to think that I’m completely negative on Facebook.)

Facebook Video is very simple, which I think is part of its charm. You can upload videos that you have on your computer or you can capture video right from your Web camera and send that to all of your friends or to certain specific friends as a video message.

Uploading videos that you have on your computer isn’t that exciting. That’s what we have YouTube for.

Being able to send video messages is what excites me. I have an Apple MacBook, which means I have a Web camera built into the lid of my laptop. (This is so genius of Apple.) So… all I have to do is literally open the “Create a new message window,” hit record, and start talking into the camera. It’s that easy.

There are times which I’m tired and don’t feel like penning War & Peace in the form of an e-mail. It’s so much easier to just to open up Facebook Video, type in the person’s name, hit the record, and start talking. I’ve been doing this with one of my best friends from college. It’s so much fun.

With video, so much more comes across. You get the emotion and personality so much clearer from the person that you’re talking to. It’s quite cool.

So you’re assignment for today, if you have a Web camera, go on Facebook Video and send me a video message and I’ll send you one back. As I said before, this should be incredibly easy for those of you that have Apple MacBooks.

You’ll see how much more fun it is then sending e-mail.

When The Week Gets Away From You

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It happens way to easily. You get crazy busy at work. You get home and you’re exhausted. The last thing on your mind is blogging. All you want to do is to relax and kill some brain cells by watching reality TV.

Well a huge part of blogging is writing consistently. The key is to get back on the horse again and just go at it. Don’t give up just because you haven’t posted in a few days.

So… Yeah this week was nuts for me. All I had on my mind after word was this really cool bottle of California Cabernet and watching season 3 of Hell’s Kitchen. Well now, it’s time to get back on the blogging train. The week got away from me but the weekend won’t.

Launch of the DC Technology Network

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Screenshot of the DC Technology Network Ning Site

One thing that I took away from BarCamp DC was that there is a really awesome tech community in the Washington DC area. It may be spread across a number of groups. It may be in multiple states. Regardless, there is an awesome technology community that exists.

The question I and a number of others had was how can we bring this community together. We need one place online where the community can go to chat with one another and keep up with what’s going on. It’d aggregate a lot of information from other sites. My esteemed DC colleagues agreed.

I’m very happy to announce the launch of the DC Technology Network. It is a social networking site powered by Ning. While the site is very primitive (or beta) and still evolving, I think it’s a fun and interesting way for us to all stay in touch and maintain that awesome feeling that existed at BarCamp DC.

So… if you live in the Washington DC metro area (or formerly lived in the area) and want to stay in touch with your fellow local geeks, PLEASE SIGN UP for the DC Technology Network.

Have you signed up? What do you think? How can we make this more useful?