We’re all craving human connection right now more than ever, which is difficult because we can’t physically connect with other humans.  So how do we create connections online? Where do we start? How do we bridge that gap, or take the first step?

Today I’m sharing 10 ways that you can begin to connect and create relationships online because it can seem scary and intimidating at first.  These tips and ideas are just a starting point to help you see how easy it is to reach out and connect, whether it’s someone you would really love to collaborate in business with, or you just love their vibe and want to start building a friendship.

Breaking down the points for you, we’re going to talk about:

• Engaging
• Letting people into YOUR brand and who YOU are
• Think of the humans, not the #’s
• Showing up consistently
• Asking “How can I support YOU?”
• Start a Movement
• Give, Give, Give
• Collaboration
• Pay to Play
• Be bold & take the first step

I’ve got a  big announcement too: I have a brand new program called Speak Your Truth Academy opening its’ doors May 19, 2020.  

This program is all about how to use your personal story to leverage & build an actual business. You have a story, everyone has a story and I want to start to help more female entrepreneurs use their voice to speak up and to share their truth to actually impact and reach the people that they want to reach and make money doing it. This will be the very first time I’m running it, and I’ve got some really, really special things planned for it. I can’t wait to share the details. So if you want to be the first to know all the things and get a little sneak peek as to what’s coming down the line, make sure to jump on the waitlist!  

Are you ready? Get listening right away by clicking the link above, or if you’re more in the mood to read today keep scrolling for the full transcription of today’s episode! Let’s do this!

Don’t forget I’ll be going live on Instagram & Facebook every weekday at 8am ET until the global pandemic / quarantine / isolation is over, whenever that may be. Come join me over there!!

Look for references from today’s episodes?  Find them all here:

We’re Not Really Strangers Cards

Jessica Yellin on Instagram

SPEAK YOUR TRUTH ACADEMY WAITLIST

ROOM TO GROW PODCAST EPISODES:

#147 – [BIZ TIPS]Show Your Face on Live Video without Fear:Getting on Live Video

#144 – [BIZ TIPS]How an Awkward Introvert Makes Friends Around The Globe

#118- The Dark Side of Social Media:Stalking, Protecting Your Privacy & Mental 

 

 

Hey there, welcome back to the Room to Grow Podcast and today’s episode is another one that I did on Instagram Live and it’s all about how to make connections with people and to build those types of relationships that I often talk about on here, when you’re just starting out, because it’s tough. Even if you are a little bit more established, there’s actually a lot of things in here that apply universally, and that I still use all the time in my everyday life, in my business, all of these things that absolutely helped me to build connections and to build relationships with people that I just want to be friends with. Sometimes it doesn’t even have to always be from a business standpoint, I think that there’s just a lot of things that some of us miss or overlook that are small details that can absolutely move the dial when it comes to building these types of connections and relationships, but especially when it comes to our business, and particularly when we don’t have the option of attending live events right now, of seeing people in in person as much, we have to focus on the online factor. So I hope that this is helpful. I got some really fantastic feedback about this one, which is why I wanted to share it here on the podcast as well. And before we dive in, I wanted to remind you that the waitlist is now open for my brand new program Speak Your Truth Academy. So this is something I’ve been working on for a while now. And it’s going to be all about how to use your personal story and stories to leverage those to build them into an actual business. Because listen, you have a story, you have a story, and it might not have a ton of dramatics attached to it or anything like that. I never want anyone to think that they have to have some super over the top dramatic story for anyone to pay attention and for it to be worth sharing. That simply is not the case. Everyone has a story and I want to start to help more female entrepreneurs use their voice to speak up and to share their truth to actually impact and reach the people that they want to reach and make money doing it. Because you deserve to be paid for your work. So I’m really excited to share this program, all of the references are in the show notes to grab the waitlist, and the doors are opening on May 19 of 2020. This will be the very first time I’m running it. And I’ve got some really, really special things planned for it. I can’t wait to share the details. So if you want to be the first to know, first to find out, all the things and get a little sneak peek as to what’s coming down the line, make sure to jump on the waitlist, all listed over on the show notes. So we’re going to dive in today to how to connect with people online. Please enjoy. 

 

I do these every weekday morning. These are all about connection and then we get into that day’s topic all about online business, podcasting, entrepreneurship. What else do we talk about? mental health, all the things! So Yeah, I’m not wearing a bathrobe again! I’m just shaking things up over here. I went out for a walk early this morning. I had a little catch up with a friend on the phone. Yeah, and it’s a beautiful sunny day today. It’s gonna be a good day, guys. Yesterday I was so unproductive to the point where I literally didn’t do anything other than that live yesterday morning. And if for anyone who watched yesterday’s I was so out of it, I was so discombobulated, I ended up going back to bed again, afterwards, like I went for another nap. Because I was so tired. I felt like I just couldn’t even function as a human. So much better today. I feel like I needed that full day of just recharge. And now I’m good to go. So we’re on fire today. Okay, so we are going to pull up the connection card and then we are covering a question that was submitted all about how to make connections online. I mean, online is mostly our only option right now. Especially when first starting out. So we’re going to get into all of that. Let’s pull a card out of the We’re Not Really Strangers deck. How likely am I to go camping? and how high maintenance is my setup? Okay, so I didn’t do a lot of camping when I was a kid, however I do actually like camping but I don’t love camping. Let me put it that way. I like it, but I don’t love it. So if you ask me to go camping, I’m totally down but I likely am not going to want to go for longer than like, four to five days. That’s kind of my limit. In terms of how high maintenance my setup is,  Ummmmm, I don’t know, semi high maintenance, but not not super high maintenance. The thing is, I’m not a high maintenance person at all. I’m honestly not, like I don’t even do a lot of the other stuff that a lot of my girlfriends do like you know the lashes and this and that, I’m pretty basic, honestly that’s like legit, but I also really like a good night’s sleep in a solid bed. And you know those types of things and like extra pillows sometimes are nice, who doesn’t love extra pillows? So I’m gonna go with a semi high maintenance setup. I am capable of doing a very low maintenance setup and I have before but did I enjoy it? expressly? Not? No, I didn’t. I was like, No, I need a real bed. So yes, I will go camping. But don’t ask me to go camping for longer than like, four to five days I tap out. I’m like, okay, I’m done. Go get me a hotel or an Airbnb.

 

Okay, so now that we know that about me. Alright, so we’re going to talk about how to make connections online when just starting out and I get it because this is super daunting. This is very, it’s going to be kind of very intimidating. And it can feel extremely slow. It’s like, okay, I am doing the work. What is the problem? Why are things not happening? I don’t understand. And it takes time. So the first thing that I want to say like right off the bat is that this absolutely does take patience, more patience than you probably even think that you were capable of right now. So I just want to throw that out there because I want to let you know that it is normal to be feeling maybe a little bit frustrated, that it might feel as though things are going slower than you’d like them to. But let’s get into this a little bit. So as a caveat to this, another podcast episode that I have that would actually be probably helpful for this is Episode 144 of the room to grow podcast and it’s all about how an awkward introvert makes friends around the globe. It’s been a really popular episode, and a lot of people have referred back to it and then told me that they appreciate some of the tips and stuff I offered in there. So that could potentially help as well but it’s a little bit different than some of the things I’m going to talk about today. So first and foremost, we’re really focusing on online connections here because in the awkward introvert episode, it can be online but a lot of the stuff in there also applies to in person stuff. So today we’re gonna focus just with the online stuff because I think that’s really important for everything that we are dealing with right now. We can’t really do the in person stuff the way we normally would. So first and foremost is to engage, to just flat out engage, comment on other people’s posts, like other people’s posts, search hashtags, all of that stuff. Send people DM’s, let people know that you’re there, that you’re watching, that you are paying attention, that you’re interested in and engaged in what they’re doing, and that you’re showing them then that they’re doing something of value that matters to you. Because think about how much we appreciate it when people do that for us. When somebody reaches out to me and tells me how much they love the podcast, or how much a post that I put up really resonated with them, even if I just put up some ridiculous IG story, and somebody responds with a comment, I’m like, Oh, that’s awesome. Like they actually really like what I’m putting out. That’s amazing. So I want you to put yourself in the other person’s shoes, the person or people that you’re trying to reach. We want that engagement, but it feels super awkward sometimes, because we’re like, oh, you know, people don’t want to hear from us. Who am I to reach out to this person, I don’t want to waste their time. There’s all kinds of things that they come up with. I don’t have anything interesting to say. All of these things start coming up. Trust me, one of the most awkward humans on Earth, I fully understand. But I think that sometimes when we put ourselves on the opposite side of the table, then we start to remember how much we appreciate it when people do that for us. So it’s really cool when we can do that for somebody else. So engaging in a variety of formats is going to be super, super important. 

 

The next one is to let people get to know the person behind the brand and behind the screen. I will tell you something, when I go to someone’s Instagram page, regardless of what it’s about, regardless of what they offer, what their services are, what they sell, whatever it is, if I can’t find the face of the person who is putting up the posts, I am immediately turned off by the account. I don’t care what you were talking about, I don’t care what you are offering, selling, any of that. You have to put your face up because people connect with the person. People connect with the face to face interaction, people connect with the human being, that is what creates that human connection. So if you are looking to connect with people more, you can’t just rely on things like quote cards and photos of nature, and photos of anything but you. When you’re looking at in terms of the Instagram grid, you want to have a photo of your face or video or whatever of you usually at least once every 9 to 12 squares minimum. The posts that get the most engagement, the research is very clear, is the people who actually show their faces and stuff.  if you, because I didn’t used to either so I get this, I completely understand this.  When I started out I didn’t put my face up really at all. I was like, nope, nope, nope, not happening. And then I would start to experiment a little bit and if I put up a photo of myself, it would get significantly more engagement, likes, comments, all of that by a longshot,  there wasn’t even a comparison in terms of that compared to a photo that had nothing to do with with me or my face in any way, you have to show your face! That is a huge turnoff to me. And again, the research backs me up here. I’m not the only one that feels this way. If you think about it, if you go to somebody’s website or something like that, and you’re potentially, you’re not even necessarily looking to buy, you’re just intrigued, like, okay, tell me what you’re about, show me all the things. If you don’t see any sort of human being anywhere to be found. It’s like, okay, who am I even talking to? Then why would they buy from you over somebody else that they actually do connect with? If they can’t make the connection, they’re not going to buy from you, much less connect with you in any way. Think about a brand like Nike. Nike sells shoes, but when you see Nike advertisements, they don’t show you just the shoe, they show you the human wearing the shoe, and then they tell the story of the human wearing the shoe. That’s what connection looks like. So you have to really be cognizant of that and actually show your face. People want to see the person behind the brand. So that’s going to be really, really important to your connection factor. That’s going to be huge to connect with people on a deeper level because people want you, they want you. Another great example, this is just one example: think about, I don’t know if you know Jessica Yellin, I would go look up Jessica Yellin; DM me if you need her handle, and I can find it for you and share her profile. She does News, Not Noise. So she reads the news every day. She does like Instagram IGTV every single day. Talks about the news all that but her entire platform is built on this whole idea of cutting out the bullshit around the news. She then shares it in a succinct way and highlights maybe what is being pushed to one side elsewhere and gives you the full story in a clear, succinct manner that doesn’t have all the fluff. Awesome. But guess what she is showing her face every time she does news. And she will go in her stories to explain something or whatever. So people connect with that because they’re connecting with her. They’re connecting with the human being. That’s why, you know, certain news shows do better than others. If we’re talking about this, like from a news aspect, because people connect with the news anchor. They turn on their TV every night, not just to hear the news, but because they’ve grown attached to the particular news anchor that they really like to follow. It’s the exact same thing with social media, even more so with social media, because right now we’re craving human connection more than ever before. So you have to show your face. I don’t care if you’re uncomfortable, you have to show your face!. Trust me, I say this as somebody who was terrified to go on camera. I know I’ve mentioned this before because I used to sweat through my shirts. I used to be having panic attacks every time I’d go on camera, and the only way that I knew to get over it You will grow into that confidence, but don’t underestimate the power of yourself. Because people aren’t going to connect with a quote card. People don’t care. Yeah, it’s great, for a meme share, whatever, but people want you, they want you, they want to know the person behind the brand. So out of all the other, and I still have a bunch of points to go through, but out of all the points I’m gonna make this is the most important one that I can offer you! If somebody DM’s me, or sends me a message or something like that, and they want to connect with me on a more significant level, and I go look at their page and I can’t even see the human behind the page. I’m like, Who is this? Especially as somebody who has been tracked online before under fake accounts, I am extremely, I’m like, extra, very wary of that if I can’t see the face of the person behind the brand, just because of that personal experience that has really shifted things for me. But even for just the average person who hasn’t had that kind of experience, the research is very clear, we connect with the person behind the brand. So that’s gonna be really important. 

 

Okay, next up is to remember that you’re speaking to real humans and not numbers, that I think is really important, because it can be so easy to get caught up in the numbers game. So easy to get caught up in the numbers game. Because we look at you know, the numbers of followers and we look at the number of people watching our stories and all of this and it’s so easy to think of them as numbers as opposed to humans. But when you start to remember that you’re actually speaking to real human beings who want to connect, and who are genuinely interested in what you’re doing and what you’re offering and how you’re showing up. That changes things a little bit. I talk about this a lot with my podcast clients too, because people will say to me, you know, what are good download numbers? And I’m like, good download numbers are numbers that over time very slowly increase, even if it’s by like a minimal, minimal amount. Because what we forget is that we’re being given the gift of being able to speak to the potential for an unlimited number of people out there. So when you see that you have, I don’t know, 100 podcast downloads. Think about speaking to a room of 100 people. That’s huge! In fact that might also make you break into cold sweats. But I think it’s really important to remember that those are actual human beings, whereas we’ve gotten so trained to just think about it as a numbers game, that we forget that we’re speaking to real humans, and that’s going to be really important to remember this connection factor. This connection is like bread through all of this. Because if people can’t connect with the person, and if we forget that we are speaking to real people, and instead, we’re just getting tied up in the numbers game, it’s gonna be really hard to show up for people and to connect on a deeper level the way we really want to. So remember that you are speaking to real humans, that’s super important. To show up consistently, and to do the work. That may seem like a basic one, but it is really important. We can’t just pop up every once in a while when we feel like it and go, Oh, hey, I’m back. Because if you start every sentence with, ‘I’m back’, because you take these long breaks in between, what you’re doing is you’re actually just highlighting that you disappeared and then people are like, Oh, she left? Well, is she going to do that, again, you know, how can I even depend on her then like, what’s the deal? It’s one thing if we’re just talking about a weekend social media detox or something, but if you’re disappearing for semi longer periods of time and on a regular basis, and then you’re like I’m back and you make a huge deal out of it. First of all, people don’t care nearly as much as you think. Like we just don’t, we’re all like wrapped up in our own little worlds. You know, somebody I know, I know people before they’ve taken weekend social media detoxes and then pop back up and they’re like, Hey, guys, and make this huge deal of it. I’m like, No, I just think it’s actually really healthy that you took a social media detox, and talk about the benefits of that, like all of that, but we maybe don’t need to pretend as though you disappeared on a six month sabbatical and you’re making your way back to the world. Like it’s just not really like that. Right? So I think that that’s really important too, is to make sure that we are showing up consistently, that we are showing up maybe sometimes even when we don’t feel like it. Balancing that out against the mental health factor because for anyone who knows me I’m very much all about that. And yesterday was a bit of a mental health day for me. I got virtually nothing done and at some point, I just accepted it. I was like, You know what, I need to just not do anything today and it’s going to then set me up to be that much better tomorrow, because I clearly need this like I am mentally and physically exhausted, and I just need to take the day off. Great, take the day off. This is my whole thing is that when you’re tired, rest, but don’t stop because it’s a lot harder to get started once you have come to a complete dead stop for extended periods of time, do even just a little bit consistently. And people are going to notice that. And if I go to somebody’s account, and they never post, I’m probably not going to engage with them. Because I need to know that they’re actually showing up and doing the work. That’s who I want to surround myself with. So that’s going to be really important as well.

  

The next one is to make the connection about the other person. So how can you help them? one of my favorite questions to ask people and I try to ask this of as many people as I can, when I’m in conversation and connecting with them, especially in the business world is, how can I support you, or what can I do to support you? And you’ll get some really great answers sometimes, like some really fantastic answers. And whatever they respond with, I try, like I put an effort to actually follow through with that, and to do whatever I can to support them in the way that they feel would be best for them. If I’m able to help them out in that way, I will definitely do so. And even just asking is going to be a really big part of that. Like just asking the question, the first time somebody in the business world asked me that, like, how can I support you? In fact, I think it was my friend Lisa Carpenter. And Lisa has been a huge, huge support to me over the years. She’s fantastic. I believe her handle is @LisaCarpenterInc. I’ve had her on the podcast, I also had her on my first podcast on Fit & Healthy Mind as well, she’s just an incredible human being. She was the one who actually really gave me a big push to quit my corporate job as well. And I haven’t even worked with her in a paid capacity. She’s just that awesome. She’s been so supportive of me even when I haven’t even actually paid her as a coach. This is just purely from a friendship aspect. She’s been amazing. And I was really blown away the first time she asked me that I was like, Oh my god, I don’t think anybody’s ever asked me like, how can I support you? And it’s just such a comforting question. But you have to do it from a genuine place, you have to be willing to actually do what you can, or at least try to do whatever you can to follow through on the answer to that question. So if somebody says How can I support you? You want to give them an answer that is real, and that hopefully they might actually be able to help you with too. If somebody responds with introduce me to the Queen of England, that might not be impossible, but you know what I’m saying, do whatever you can, as long as it’s like a reasonable request and you can do something about it, DO IT!  That’s going to give a ton of value to the other person.

 

As well, this one is a little bit maybe odd, but start up some sort of movement or challenge that people want to be a part of. This can come in so many different ways. But people love a challenge. And everybody’s home right now so people are searching around online and they’re more likely to be open to the idea of doing a challenge, if it’s something that appeals to them. I mean, there’s all kinds of health and fitness challenges that you could go down into, all kinds of things, for the Jessica Yellen example she started this as opposed to a challenge is more of a movement in terms of this, like #newsnotnoise thing. And that’s really taken off and people really appreciate that about her. That’s why they follow her for this News, Not Noise. So there’s so many different things you can do here. And you can start your own hashtag, get people to start using it, and it might be slow at first. That’s normal, that’s part of business, that’s part of the online business especially, things like going to take time. But it’s something that you can start right away and you can end up carrying that on longer term. And people get excited about that, people want to be part of something, especially right now because people are craving connection. They want to feel like they are part of something that is bigger than themselves. So if you can start something like that, that’s going to be really, really powerful to get people to go like, wow, look what Jennifer is up to. Or hey, you know, look, look what Look what Emily’s doing over there, like, whatever that looks like. That’s gonna be a really, really powerful way to bring people together. And then you can start this almost little like your own community. That’s what it’s all about is building community, right? And you’re bringing people in, and then they’re getting to know each other. And then you’re getting this like cross support. It’s super cool. So if you can do something like that, there’s a huge amount of power in that. Things like Facebook groups, starting a Facebook group, that’s huge right now. You can do the Instagram hashtag thing. There’s so many ways to do this, so many different ways to do this. And just start like getting a little bit creative and thinking outside the box. And you’re going to see a whole lot of opportunities start popping up. 

 

Let me see here. So giving as well, I mean, I know I’ve kind of already touched this, but offer something to someone else’s community and offer value. And be generous too, be generous with whatever it is you’re offering. So reach out to someone who is maybe in a similar field or who has something or who does something that you could fill a gap with. And you see what they’re doing and you’re like, Hey, I’ve got this thing that I would love to offer your community. Maybe it’s free training, maybe it’s a PDF or whatever you want to do. There’s so many different ways that you can do that and offer value. Be generous with your time, if you want people to be generous with theirs, you have to be generous with yours first. That’s the same principle as anything else. If you want other people to be generous, you also need to be generous and you usually need to be generous first to expect it to come back to you eventually. I say expect, but to do it without expectation is by far the best and that is what is going to benefit you in the longer term. I’ve done that a lot, and there is a line here, because if you give too much of yourself, not only will it exhaust you, but you’ll become resentful at some point of how much you are giving away of yourself and, you know, feeling maybe like you’re entitled to something and then you’re not getting it back. And that can just create this whole resentment cycle. But if you are, if you know your boundaries, and you’re giving without expectation, my belief is that that will end up coming back to you. Sometimes it doesn’t come back to you in the exact form that you expected. Sometimes it’s often even better than you expected. Sometimes it might not come back on the timeline that you wanted it to without either. So these things can take time. I’m going to bring it back to this patience factor. But I think it is really important to remember that the more you give, in my mind, the more you end up getting back in a variety of ways, a huge variety of ways. And we all know that it just feels really good to give, too. People notice that, people notice you giving value. They might be noticing very quietly, they might not actively tell you, at least not right away. But when you’re putting in the effort, when you’re showing up with value, when you’re coming from a place of service, that is absolutely going to serve you in the longer term. Absolutely hands down going to serve you in the longer term. Again, not necessarily on the timeline that we wanted to we’re like, Okay, are we there yet? What’s happening? but it will come back, it just is sometimes going to take longer than we maybe want it to but when you are showing up with value consistently, that is massive, and that is going to pay you back tenfold in the longer term. 

 

Okay, collaboration. So again, all of these things are kind of tied in with each other but if you can offer to do like a guest spot or maybe for like a Facebook Live or IGTV or invite someone onto yours to do a joint IGTV or something like that. Maybe you have a private Facebook group that you could bring somebody else in to speak or maybe someone else has a private Facebook group that you could offer to speak in. There’s so many different ways that you can do this. One thing that I did a couple years ago was when I was still in the health and fitness space I came up with a freebie that then I collaborated with a bunch of women that I was in a mastermind with. So there were probably I believe, 14 of us that ended up doing it, where we all came up with a different freebie. And then I was sort of the head of it because I had a podcast so the ladies wanted me to kind of head it because then I could advertise it more widely. I had a main lead page then where people opted in. So I got their email addresses. And then once they opted in, they then got free access to choose from this whole variety of the 14 lead magnets that they might want. So then anyone else that they then they got their products or their freebie I mean, then the person who one of the other women in the group, then they got their email address as well. So it was a win win for everybody, like everybody built out their email list, at least to some degree. And then the people signing up, got access to all these different incredible freebies. It was a win win all around. And all of us built our list quite a bit. I think I added between 150 and 200 emails to my email list just from that one thing alone, which was huge. That was amazing. I was blown away. And that was just a relatively basic collaboration effort. It wasn’t rocket science and all it was was just different people coming together to create something super cool that a lot of different people benefited from and it was amazing. It can be the simplest little thing by that but it’s like that, but any type of Collaboration is going to go a really long way. I am all about the collaboration. I am also all about being very careful with whom you align yourself because you are your own brand. And if you are taking on somebody else’s stuff, basically, you have to be very sure that your values align with that other person and with their brand, and that that’s going to be mutually beneficial. But think about that, I want you to think about that more and how you can start to collaborate with more people in your industry or in your field. And reach out to people if you reach out to people and you’re offering value and you’re showing up in their DMS every once in a while and you know you are looking to help them. I think that that is going to be really, really powerful for you in the longer term. 

 

Next one is pay to play. I’m just gonna say it, sometimes you have to pay to play and some of the best connections that I’ve made have been through paid masterminds, paid groups, paid coaching of some sort. However, I don’t want to discourage you in any way because I’ve also made some incredible, incredible connections that no money was ever exchanged. It was just somebody cool that I met on the internet or at an event, I know that’s not possible right now, so we’re focusing on the online, but there are some really cool people that I’ve never met in person, all kinds of people. There’s actually far more cool connections I’ve made online likely than I could even list of ones that I’ve met in person at events, just because, you know, you get chatting on the internet, and you’re like, Hey, how’s it going? which ties into my next point, which is to reach out and actually just make the ask, like, reach out, make the introduction, introduce yourself, offer value, be generous, ask how you can support them, all of these things are tied together. All of them are tied together. Yeah, sometimes you will need to pay to play but there are so many free options out there that I don’t want you to stress over that  just keep that in mind as an option. That can be really fantastic but maybe that’s a little bit later on. In the meantime, there are so many things that you can do to make these free connections that are incredibly genuine. Just make sure that the people that you are reaching out to are people that you were actually interested in having some sort of a friendship relationship with.  That is going to be the biggest aspect of this, don’t reach out to people because they have a certain number of followers or because you know, you think that you have some sort of power play in the back of your mind. Give without expectation. I’m going to keep bringing it back to that as well. To me that applies to anything, give without expectation. Also, know your boundaries, because if you give too much and you’re giving all the time you’re going to get really resentful, but if you give without expectation, to a degree that you’re comfortable with it that is going to be so incredibly powerful for you. For the other person, really beautiful friendships and relationships can come out of that. But don’t be afraid to reach out to people. And as an introvert, I get it. This is uncomfortable, it’s awkward. It’s like, Oh, I don’t know what I’m doing. So I still recommend listening to Episode 144 of the podcast, How an Awkward Introvert Makes Friends Around the Globe, because even though a lot of the things that I mentioned in there were a lot of more like in person related things, the same principles still apply, and still tie in with everything that I’ve mentioned today that is more specific to online only. The connections are there, guys. The connections are there. They’re there waiting to be had but we’re just staying so comfortable and stuck in our little awkward corners where we don’t want to come out and we’re just waiting for people to reach out to us. It’s probably not going to happen. It might and that’s great, but especially when you’re just starting out you’re gonna have to put yourself out there, if you want to see the benefit, you’re going to have to, and you’re going to have to get more comfortable with it and make sure that you’re showing your face. I’m going to keep bringing it back to that one too. Show your face, show your face on Instagram stories, give people a little sneak peek behind your life. Do something to throw in a photo of yourself, like every 9 to 12 squares, do a little intro post, those posts that I do and I don’t do them very often. But once in a while when I do throw up an introduction post or it’s like a few little things you might not know about me. The engagement is like, unbelievable. It still surprises me sometimes I’m like, do people really care that I’m six feet tall in real life, like they care that much? really? and I get that that’s maybe like a little more unusual, but there’s all kinds of just super random, like stupid things that I could tell you about myself and people love that stuff. But then when I turn it around, and I think about what I like looking at and reading on other people’s posts, I love that stuff. I love getting to learn a little bit more about somebody and getting to have like, almost a little sneak peek into their lives. I love that. So think about what you like looking at or reading or engaging with on other people’s content, and then flip it around on yourself. Because when it’s us, we’re like, Well, why are people interested? But when we’re looking at somebody else, we’re like, oh, that’s really cool. I didn’t know that about her. Right? It’s so weird. We’re so bizarre as humans, but we need to think about that more often. And to really get clear on how we are showing up and actually just showing up and not just showing up visually, but showing up in people’s inboxes, in their comment section, saying hello, like, hey, that’s really cool and show that you’ve actually read the post too. There are too many comments that I’ve gotten that I don’t know if they’re just bots, or if they’re just people being ignorant where they will post something that is so completely opposite or has no relation to the post that I put up. It’s, it’s obvious that they didn’t even read it. And I have no interest in engaging with somebody like that because I’m like, okay, you didn’t even read it, you clearly have no interest, and you’re just out to get something from me. If any of us get that vibe from somebody, we don’t want to engage with people like that. So that’s why I’m telling you, you need to be generous, you need to give without expectation, and you need to engage in a genuine way. If you want to see that in return for yourself, and to have patience, because it will take time. But I promise you, if you’re doing this work consistently, and you’re showing up, you will see the rewards of this, it might just take a little bit longer than you’re potentially expecting it to. 

 

Okay, so I hope that this is helpful. Let me know if you have any questions, please pop into my DM’s. It would be awesome to hear from you guys. You know I love hearing from you. So thank you so much for being here. Talk to you soon.

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