First things first - Does any of this sound familiar to you?

• Your following on Twitter is growing and your retweets, ratios and direct messages are solid;
• You have hundreds of Facebook friends who nudge, poke, pic and update constantly;
• Professionals are lining up on LinkedIn to connect to you, join your groups and network;
• Your Ning-based social networks are numerous and brimming with interest-specific goodness;
• You keep eight browsers open at once, hot-key between sites and have leveraged online efficiency tools to the hilt;
• Your blog is ripe with comments and people really Digg you; and
• Your seven different email addresses always ensure that messages await your wisdom and wit.

You are a maven, you are in demand, you are everywhere and you are loving every second of it.  Take a bow Rock Star!

But there’s one thing I neglected to mention - all of this is useless if you don’t take things offline.

‘Useless’ Mark, c’mon dude, seriously?  I get mad traffic, huge Technorati authority and am known in the industry man.  You are so 1983 Mr. Roboto, so wake up to the new age and quit your whining old man.

Fair feedback (except the old man bit, although I was recently mistaken for Steve Martin on the streets of DC.  I digress…).  

But listen, there are five reasons that you need to step away from the keyboard and get the hell offline (not the least of which is to return feeling to the fleshy bit of bodice between your hands and your head). Here we go:

1. It’s Unexpected: You want to really get someone’s attention? Pick up the phone. That’s right, pick up the ole handset, dial them up and have a conversation. You will be thrilled at how voices, inflection, real laughter, emotion and sincerity fundamentally change the way you connect online in the future.
2. It’s Personal: Online anonymity offers a comfortable screen that you can pull to expose at your own pace. And despite the depth of the online content you exchange - the comments you both laugh at and the heartfelt expressions of goodwill and empathy - it’s still impersonal. To morph from acquaintance to friend, you need to get intimate. I’m not talking hopes, dreams and aspirations, per se, but I am referring to the need to connect at another level.
3. It’s A Test: We don’t like to admit this, but we usually put our closest friends through a series of unspoken feats of relationship strength. Have you ever thought, “If they still like me after [insert awful thing/fact/experience], they are definitely a good friend”? We’ve all been on both sides of that coin, and if you recover it’s a bonding moment that’s difficult to beat. Such experiences can rarely be found online, and I for one have never commiserated over “that wild-ass Tweet” with a true friend.
4. It’s Stickier: How easy is it to drop an online friend? Hell, Burger King counted on hunger trumping friendship when they ran their Whopper Sacrifice promo a few months back on Facebook (and they were right). Bottom line is that one wrong move online and you are unfollowed, banned, blocked and banished in a heartbeat. But the more time you spend with someone offline, the more difficult it becomes to whimsically play catch and release.
5. It’s Meaningful: I have met an unbelievable number of wonderful people via online media and I am so grateful that these tools have allowed me to connect with those I might not have otherwise met. But what made those relationships really bring me joy was the hour I invested in a phone call, or the two hours I spent over a meal, or the thirty minutes grabbing coffee, or the three days together at a conference. These are the memories that turned acquaintances into growing friendships, and I wouldn’t give that up for the world.

If you’re still reading this post, I’d ask you to give it a try. Just pick one person from your multitude of networks and give it a shot. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

What do you think? Share your opinions here (or call me - *grin*) and let’s keep the conversation going.

This entry was posted on Friday, April 10th, 2009 at 5:13 pm and is filed under General Thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.