Two points on networking online

This week I’m featured in a theme on online networking in the popular Danish womens magazine, ‘Femina’, where I try to explain some of the opportunities and pitfalls of putting yourself out there on the web.

Besides feeling honoured to be considered worthy for such a treat and slightly put off by how I look (I’m not that photogenic), there are a couple of points, I mention in the interview with me that I would like to reiterate here.

The first point is regarding the “Should I spend time on networking?” question. It’s very popular in some circles to disregard networking as something important and instead look at it as a perhaps convinient waste of precious time and ressources. I think that view is plain stupid.

Look, it’s a fact of life that a lot of opportunities are awarded to people who know other people. Why? Because it’s just so much easier to work with someone, you already know. In other words: If you think networking is a waste of time, you’re the one missing out on exciting opportunities. It’s of course your call, but you should at least be aware of the fact that the only one you cheat is - yourself.

The second point, I would like to restate is that social networking online is essentially not about technology. It’s not about whether one service has a slightly different feature set than the other. It’s about where the best place for you is to connect. If it’s the ugliest looking site with lots of script errors and other scary stuff, so be it (eventhough I don’t think such a site would get a huge traction). If it’s a flashy feng-sui kind-of-site, so be it. Not important.

Connectings and the inherent value of same on the longer term is what matters. First and last. Nothing else.

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