I’ve made many wonderful connections through the social web, but the magic really happens when I’ve strengthened those bonds by turning those online friends into offline relationships. I had some cool experiences last week that I wanted to share with you.
Amy Howell and I have become fast Twitter friends and cemented our relationship a few months ago when she visited me during a business trip to our area. I was able to return the favor last week when she hosted Chris Brogan at a community event in Memphis. While it was great to meet Chris, it was even more rewarding to meet a dozen or so of my other close Twitter friends for the first time like Jeremy Victor, Kathy Snavely, Eric Fletcher, Glen Gilmour, Kent Huffman, Anne Gallaher and Ryan Sauers. Who knows where new friendships like this will lead?
On my way to Memphis I stopped in Nashville to have lunch with another Twitter friend Laura Click. I was moved by the flooded devastation in this nearby city and Laura’s own personal story. She agreed to write a guest post about her experiences and we are also exploring ways to work together on some other upcoming projects. I’m sure we would not have found these synergies without taking the time to meet face to face.
After my trip to Memphis, I drove to Indianapolis to give a speech at the American Public Power Association conference. Yes, I spent a lot of time in the car last week! So I tried an experiment — could I use this time productively to “meet” even more of my Twitter friends? I sent out a tweet inviting folks to call me during my drive to talk about any marketing topics on their mind. Not only was this a pleasant way to pass the time, I was able to help one contact with a job lead and another call resulted in a possible consulting engagement for me.
Twitter is such a powerful networking tool but you can really unleash its power by connecting in the offline world too! Have you had similar experiences?
My week in pics: 1) Laura Click 2) Jeremy Victor 3) Eric Fletcher, Amy Howell, Jim Howell, Glen Gilmour, 4) Trey Pennington 5) Amy Howell 6) Kathy Snavely