Tuesday, October 27, 2015

Let’s Try This Again: My Social Media Guidelines

I thought I was fairly straightforward earlier this year when I outlined my personal social media guidelines with regards to connecting with me on Facebook and LinkedIn.

Apparently I wasn’t as clear as I’d hoped, so let me go over it again.

I realize that there are now roughly 1.4 billion Facebook users and 380 million members on LinkedIn, but that doesn’t mean that every one of you has to attempt to “friend” me or connect with me.

My rules are simple – if I don’t know you, don’t contact me in an attempt to join your social media network. It’s not that I’m virulently anti-social or just plain mean – although you might receive a slightly different spin on that claim from those who know me – it’s just that I don’t want to be among someone’s 1,356 friends on Facebook or another’s goal of reaching 1,000 connections on LinkedIn. There’s absolutely no way anybody can be on a first name basis with that many people. Unless of course you’re a career politician and it’s getting to be donor time.

But I digress.

If I friend you or connect with you it’s because I know you and want to. It’s that simple.

This weekend I received three invites from Facebook – from three people I did not know or had even remotely heard of.

I get enough spam in my mailbox to greet me on Monday mornings without having to weed through unwanted, not to mention unsolicited, social media invites. I’m sure they all were nice people, but please take my advice and be nice to someone else.

Now it’s not that I’m against social media.

Quite the contrary, I created a Facebook account during its embryonic stage and ditto for LinkedIn and certainly recognize the enormous power and reach of both. There are hundreds of CPA firms across the country that have relaxed what were once intractable rules prohibiting the use of social media at work and have subsequently reaped the benefits of engagement – particularly with regard to networking and business development.

But early on I pledged not to simply to add my name and profile as another friend or connection. I’ll leave that to others.

Any questions?

Good.

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