Face-to-Face networking
My belief is that statement is far from accurate. Those who are caught up in the frenzy of technology are convinced that those of us who believe in talking with individuals instead of texting constantly are way behind the curve.
Recently, there was quite the conversation on LinkedIn about the use of technology at conferences by individuals. Two distinct camps emerged. One group believed that we need to get used to people being on their phones at meetings and conferences. The other camp felt that there was time and place to use social media. They believed a conference is where we connect in person with people.
Attempt at Texting About the Conference
I was a speaker at an event. I was also a participant. I decided to use my down time to do an experiment. Now keep in mind my livelihood is training and speaking on using face-to-face networking and social media as your marketing tools.
I sat down at the table and put my smartphone down. I opened Twitter and was all set to Tweet out information that I learned during the course of the talk. Then I introduced myself to the people at my table. I had to take the initiative to introduce myself since everyone else was using his smartphone. I’m not sure they even noticed I sat down.
Before long conversations started. We were discovering that there were many connections between us that might serve each of us in the future. After all, we were at the conference exploring the same topic.
Then the speaker began. I was told he would provide the Twitter hashtag (A word or acronym that is uniformly used to refer to a particular conference so that people can find information about the conference by inserting # __________ in Twitter’s search function). Instead, he provided his phone number so people could text him, which was of little use for my experiment.
I decided to make up a hashtag for the conference.
I sat there and continually tweeted out information that I thought was relevant or interesting to my followers. Then it dawned on me, I was not really capturing the speaker or the essence his talk. I was being a reporter with sound bites that may or not be of any use to anyone.
I was feeling somewhat rude for no one else at the table was typing away on his smartphone. My head was buried in technology. As the experiment continued, my frustration started to grow stronger for this conference was clearly on a subject I cared a great deal about. I couldn’t keep up and it and I was aware the glow of my phone showed up distinctly in the darken room.
Conclusion about my use of Social Media at a Conference
I am going to work to keep my smartphone in my purse as much as possible. I spent the funds to meet learn and meet people in person. I’m going to save the heavy use of social media for the office or quiet cafes where I can focus more clearly on the subject at hand.
Kathy Condon is an Award-winning Author, Speaker, and Trainer on the subject of Building Relationships with the Business Community through Face-to-Face Networking and Social Media. Sign up for her blog “Kathy Condon Connects” and learn how she incorporates face-to-face networking and social media into her life. (760) 902-3094 kathy@kathycondon.info
