Feb
15
You Are Not A Bad Person And You’re Not Doing It Wrong
Email. Twitter. Facebook. LinkedIn. Google Buzz. Ponderous. Tumblr. Blogs.
Hmm. That’s a lot of stuff.
Let’s play a little imagination game.
For perspective, we’ll start by looking at my numbers. There are 25,000 or so people reading this blog. There are around 20,000 reading my newsletters. There are 6,000 on Twitter, a few hundred on my much ignored Facebook. Let’s assume that, eliminating duplicates, there are 30,000 or so people regularly tuning into my stuff.
Now that we’ve done that, we’ll totally ignore it. (It was just for perspective anyway.) Let’s pretend to erase every one of those people, and start from zero. We’ll have everything go along at the pace it’s going now, but we’ll pretend I don’t already have 30,000 readers, fans, followers or general tuners-in reading, fanning, following, or generally tuning in.
While we’re imagining that, we’ll pretend I’ve quit Twitter, that I never read or reply to blog comments, and that my cell phone number isn’t up for the whole world to see on my contact page.
We’re just going to look at email.
We’re going to slash my incoming email by over 90% and email from completely new people by a little over 75%. We’re going to pretend that I only get 10 emails from total strangers a day. These are nice, connection-y emails, not “dear webmaster of ittybiz.com” emails.
Are you with me so far in the game? No pre-existing relationships and 10 emails from new people per day. Hell, let’s go crazy and pretend like email takes weekends off. 10 a day, 5 days a week.
Now, if I’m doing this whole social web thing right, I will respond to those 10 emails.
On Monday, I have 10 new relationships and 10 outgoing emails.
Assuming I really respond – because that’s what I’m supposed to do in what Chris Brogan affectionately refers to as “social media kumbaya-ville” – and I don’t try to brush them off, about 8 recipients will respond back to me. (They’re the ones who emailed me in the first place, after all.) But let’s say that by the time I get back to them, the’ve turned in for the night, so they respond tomorrow.
Tomorrow, I get my standard 10 new emails, and those 8 from yesterday. All 10 new ones get responses, and let’s say we continue half of yesterday’s conversations. (The other half are those kind of “okay, talk to you then” emails that would be stupid to reply to.)
Tuesday, I have 20 relationships and 14 outgoing emails.
The next day, I still get my 10 new emails. I get 8 responses from the Tuesday people, and 2 from the Monday people. I respond to the 10, the 4, and both of the conversations that are still going on from Monday because I really liked those dudes.
Wednesday, I have 30 relationships and 16 outgoing emails.
By the end of the week, I have 50 new relationships. I’m still only sending 20 or so emails a day – not the end of the world. The former is a tad overwhelming and difficult to sustain, but the latter isn’t too big of a deal. At this rate of growth, nobody’s gonna die.
But the thing about these relationships we’re so fond of is that they tend to last longer than one email conversation. So the person who emailed me on Monday for some support about the fears they have about starting their own business will eventually get a sales page up. When they do, they’re going to email me because, well, I told them to. (We have a relationship and all.)
The guy who emailed to ask for an interview is going to air the interview on his (fairly high profile) blog and he’s going to bring in a lot more readers, so that will bring in more than my standard 10 emails that day.
I’ll write a post that’s going to resonate with more people than usual, and it’s going to generate an abnormal amount of replies.
If this blog never grows at a rate faster than it is now, I get 50 shiny new relationships every week from here until eternity, and all of the resulting communication. (In order for this math to work, I have to completely ignore Twitter, blog comments, trackbacks, forums, Facebook, LinkedIn, my phone and whatever shit hot new social media program the cool kids come up with next.)
This system is going to break, y’all.
The two sentence email people solve the email problem like this:
two.sentenc.es is a personal policy that all email responses regardless of recipient or subject will be two sentences or less. It’s that simple.
Classy, huh? But the governing bodies of the aforementioned Kumbaya-ville say that human connections are either our most important business asset, the most precious exchanges a human being can experience, or both, so I’m pretty sure this one is out for me. Nothing says social web like receiving 10 paragraphs of soul baring gratitude and responding with a fucking haiku.
Seth Godin answers his email personally. He often does so in three words without capitalization, but at least he does it. Is that connection? I guess that depends on how you define it.
Chris Brogan has a form that ends up in a spreadsheet, organizing messages by subject. Does it work? No idea. My guess is that it works as well as any other linear system designed to organize human behaviour remotely.
Gary Vaynerchuk – the dude who spends his entire book begging you to please, for the love of God, email! him! today! – sends you to a video autoresponder explaining that since his daughter arrived on the scene and his book became a bestseller, he can’t personally answer his emails anymore.
I have the ninjas. Sometimes they’ll respond to you. Usually they won’t. I almost definitely won’t. But we do our best, and as Don Miguel Ruiz quite beautifully says in The Four Agreements, your best changes from day to day.
Web 2.0 is like a goddamn pyramid scheme.
Limitless growth. Limitless connection. Limitless access, relationships, “friendlies”?
It can’t happen.
I get between 20 and 100 new followers a day on Twitter, and in the grand scheme of Twitter things, I’m a nobody. How can I possibly connect with all these people? I can’t. And if I think I can, it would appear I know absolutely nothing about the true meaning of connection, friendship, or intimacy.
I get about 800 emails per workday. Thanks to a pretty aggressive spam filter, less than 1% of those emails are junk. If outsourcing is impersonal and autoresponders are offensive and ignoring them is career suicide, exactly what am I supposed to do with those emails?
And that’s me, a relatively small time blogger. I don’t have 20 books under my belt like Godin or a recent bestseller and 120,000 Twitter followers like Brogan or my email address in 150,000 books like Vaynerchuk.
What if I miss that one follower who could’ve become a real, honest to God friend? What if I ignore the email from that person who really, really needed me to be there for them?
No idea, but it’s gonna happen. It happened today and it’ll happen tomorrow and it’s going to keep happening as long as I have an email address and a Twitter account.
I can’t keep up.
Neither can you.
When women entered the workforce en masse, the media treated it like the best thing since TV dinners. My God, look how much better everyone’s lives were going to become. Gonna be better for women, men, and children the world over, right?
Who would’ve thought that 30-odd years later, every women’s magazine in America would have the same stories on the cover that they did decades ago?
How to find time for it all.
How to find time for yourself.
How to keep your marriage and kids from suffering when you’re so busy.
How the hell to get dinner on the table.
How to stop hating yourself for fucking it up.
What are the stories going to be next year, ten years, 25 years from now?
How to find time for all those “relationships”?
How to find time for yourself with all those “relationships”?
How to keep your marriage and kids from suffering when you’re so busy with your “relationships”?
How the hell to get dinner on the table in the midst of your “relationships”?
How to stop hating yourself for fucking up all those “relationships”?
No-one knows. The only thing we really do know is that it’s not going away.
You’re not doing it wrong.
There is no wrong because there is no right.
It’s a broken system. It’s a naive fantasy of hyperconnected utopia. It is a first year economics student discovering communism for the first time.
It doesn’t fucking work, and the sooner we realize that, the sooner we can forgive ourselves and get on with our lives.
So, you have been up at night thinking about this, eh?
It’s a dance where there are no steps and no beat.
(Two.sentenc.es Sorry, gotta go puke.)
Okay, two sentences are ever enough.
Here’s the irony: your cell phone number is up because people want to see it, but they’d opt to spend an hour drafting a message rather than calling and talking for 10 minutes.
We understand that we can’t talk to and have meaningful conversations with 20 people per day, yet we send 20 emails.
Knowing that both you (Naomi) and you (Charlie) have trouble staying connected to people without losing your fucking minds – that makes me feel a bit better about my exploding inbox.
I get about 60 new emails a day, and not all of them are important – but A LOT of them are. And I have only so much time, but I care about all of them, and it’s hard to wait and answer when I can.
I’m still struggling with this, and I know it will only get exponentially harder to do it, the bigger I get. Because I’m getting bigger.
Now I’m gone and freaked myself out! SHIT.
Hi Rachael, your comment was rad and it made me check out your blog which is equally rad… so i guess commenting even if it is meant for one person still helps build relationships. Cheers!
Your point, Charlie, about the power of the written word is compelling. Why are folks emailing, tweeting, linking in, instead of calling a cell number. Is it permanence of the thought? Viral sharing — they are not interested in only speaking to you, Naomi, but your community. What’s so intriguing about the explosion of communication is the record of thought we are creating. Everything written. Tracked. For all to see. We are leaving a legacy.
But, Naomi, I do appreciate you letting us off the hook with this post. No legacy is perfect;)
This is both a blessing and a curse.
I have spent this week taking on Skype to an incredible group of people who I would never have otherwise “met” if it hadn’t been for Twitter.
But if you spend too long on Tweetdeck be prepared for your husband to start calling himself a Twidower.
Twidower. That’s funny.
I love the “twidower”…I think that’s what my husband is! I’ll have to enlighten him with this.
There are people starving for attention in the Internet. You get right back here and finish those emails, young lady!
My. God.
I wouldn’t know what to do with 800 emails. Actually, I do know. I would stay up for two nights straight trying to acknowledge every one and then I would say to hell with it, I’m starting a nightclub.
I wrote a post about this. It was something about the importance of acknowledging people. It is important and you do what you can in the best way you can. If you only manage to respond to 10 people a day, then you still made a difference for those 10.
Wait! I know. You could get Seth Godin to answer your emails.
Fucking genius. That was free, you can totally use it.
Naomi, you do the best you can. There are people who put it in perspective and get it. We’re still here.
Thought the social media piece was well thought through and
loved your comment of starting a nightclub.
Amen and thank you. I’m much smaller-time than you, but even I can’t keep up. It’s not possible, and certainly not in an authentic manner. And it is not getting any easier.
I appreciate that we’re all just making this up as we go along. It gives me permission to set my own rules, which is the appeal of ittybiz in the first place. If I wanted to follow someone else’s rules, I could just go get a J-O-B.
Small business, the great stress reducer, one area of life where I make the rules and all the deadlines, if there are any, are up to me. Keeps the rest in perspective.
I wish I had 10 new personal emails a day. Most of mine are mailing lists!
Often the personal emails I get, I follow up in person or by phone. They’re usually of the “hey let’s hang out at this gig” or “can you help me with something” or “haven’t talked to you in AGES!” variety. Which helps with the maintaining-relationships thing, because I’m usually catching up with a bunch of people at once, and it’s in contexts I feel happy about.
Heard of Dunbar’s number? About how we can only really connect to 150 people at any one time? You’re possibly feeling close to that.
Somebody had to say it. Good for you.
I write blogs because I like to write. I learn stuff about marketing and SEO because I want to know. If those things converge, fine. If they don’t, I figure I’ve saved myself the headaches you’re now going through.
Oh, and I reserve the right to change my mind and wish I got 800 emails.
Just sayin.
I hate to say it, but… Sounds like it’s time for a pay-wall.
Yes, for email. I’ve seen a few people offering “email mini-consults” lately, and really, that’s all this is – you get to email me for $X.99 and I will reply. Honestly, that was a huge selling point for the Speakeasy: access.
A couple years ago when I wrote about only following the people I wanted go on Twittet, there was a bit of an uproar in the comment section. I promised I’d read @replies, but that following my followers was ruining Twitter for me. Yknow what? My followers didn’t have ALL that muh they wanted me to really know.
Is a paywall anti-kumbaya? Maybe, but I think that even if you charged $1 dollar the questions would be cut in half, and they’d be better thought-out, and more valuable to the reader for that reason, and they’d probably even search the site to see if you’d already answered their question somewhere else.
This may be pure evil, but I’m willing to bet it’s the next thing coming.
I think that would totally work for that particular kind of email- would be realy good.
And I know for us some of the emails are connecting/question emails- and many of them are customer service questions. People who already bought something and are having some kind of issue/question about it.
I know some companies do, but we’re not going down the road of charging for customer service.
And, I’m curious about the access question.
Exactly! The paywall is such a good idea in theory, but the applicability kind of writes it off. Kind of like when people suggest you get some kind of VA, even for the most basic of stuff like “how do I sign up for your affiliate program?”
The problem is that so little actually falls into that category that you spend more time managing them than they do working.
Classic example: Which product should I buy? I can’t even think of a more reasonable question than that one. But the person asking it knows that the answer doesn’t exist in a vacuum, so they provide a lot of background information. They put a lot of time into that background information. Then I have to think about it, answer the question, and explain my reasoning. (Because I’m not about to start answering this kind of question with “mktg school” and then click send.)
I might spend half an hour on that email, half an hour I could bill out at $250, to potentially sell a product for $49. (The sale of which will likely come through an affiliate cookie, knocking my profit down to $24.50.) The lifetime value of that customer is possibly huge, and I also want to let them know that I really do value their $24.50, regardless of their lifetime value.
But there are only so many half hours in the day, which means that dozens are getting lost, every single day.
“The problem is that so little actually falls into that category that you spend more time managing them than they do working.”
Thank you for saying this. It has needed saying in most desperate way for a long time.
That’s an email every other minute!! that’s madness and could make a person go insane.
I am so glad for your success, your products are incredible and I’ve learned so much from you (and Dave!).
You make some fantastic points, I am in the position to respond to all my emails right now but if I play my cards right, there could be a day I do the Chris Brogan form (I really like that! ha) and it sucks for those who want to connect but at the same time, you gotta LIVE.
First sentence: You totally nailed it, I’ve been thinking about doing more and more, but I realized that I should just focus on the most important thing like writing good stuffs and creating products that rock!
Second sentence: I learned from a course about cutting out non-essential stuffs when you’re running your business, social media could very well be one of those (except you’re Gary Vaynerchuk?).
Okay, I lied, there’s a third sentence: You rock, Naomi!
Yes yes yes yes yes. Thank you for writing about this. I wish everyone could just staple this to their foreheads and remember it always. I feel so much better knowing that Seth Godin doesn’t use punctuation. Somehow, there just might be hope for the rest of us.
A-fucking-men! Great post. Totally agreed. Social media’s great to get your message out there, even connect with ‘real’ friends in ‘real’ life but I think just by being available to the masses is a bit disingenuous, you know?
And totally digging the ‘dollar-an-email’ idea!
You just saved me tons of therapy! Since re-entering social media after dropping out, I’m much, much, much more selective…I do what fits…and I feel waaaay behind. Thank you for relieving my guilt.
I’m going to keep using it as I have…keeping the good, dropping the old and, most importantly, not stress!!
Amen.
Thus why Leonie, who enjoys speaking in third person on Tuesdays, gave up her inbox.
Leonie is not divisible by 200 emails/day x Little Mermaid being born soon + creative time x oh my god I actually have a life. Does not compute.
I think I’m going to start writing Leonie bait on Tuesdays, just to see you type in the third person.
Yep. I see a lot of good people wanting to kumbaya it *and* make some money, and we all end up feeling guilty.
(My secret guilt? Not reading the blogs of my Twitter followers.)
Something’s gotta give.
And I don’t see how it works.
We have unlimited aspirations to connect, but the part that wants to connect has no idea of *capacity*.
It used to be there were only so many people you could meet for coffee/lunch/dinner.
Now?
Too much.
And by the way, I stopped Seth Godin from answering my emails.
What? I’m sorry – the guy doesn’t punctuate.
No one can “connect” with thousands of people in a reciprocal way. Networking is only relevant in the beginning, when you try to find the wee tribe that will help you get off the ground and known.
After that, what you have isn’t a network, it is an audience. It may be an interactive one in some respects, but it’s not a network like a coffee group of moms is and it can’t be treated the same way.
I am a part of your audience because I like your style of writing and I’m not good at the stuff that you teach. I don’t consider myself as part of “Naomi’s Network” since I came along too late for that. I don’t imagine that I will ever see you in person or buy you a coffee. (long way to NZ for a coffee, for a start :) )
Ummm… rats, I’m sure I had a point here, but since I didn’t stick to the two.senten.ce rule (blech), I’ve forgotten it! ;)
im in agreement with kara. i sent an email to your contact address with a question. did i expect *you* to actually read it? no. hoping for a ninja, but even then they are probly -damn- busy in order to make sure that you are just busy, and not -damn- busy.
will you read this response to your blog? maybe. but even if you dont why would i get worked up about that? i dont know you. i like your style, i like your info, so i follow you. and yes i will continue to write as if you will read what im saying, but w/o expectation.
and perhaps thats the best bit about what youve written here. realistic expectations must be realistic. its what i always thought it meant to be humble: know that you are a finite limited human being and live that way.
keep up the good work everyone!
Want to know what’s awesome?
Naomi actually does read these and responds to the “good” ones.
Even more awesome?
Her number is on her contact page and she answers!
And while I wouldn’t take up her whole day babbling about nothing (she does have email to check) you could pop in wish her a great day and ask a question.
How many bloggers or site owners do you know that do that?
I wrote about her and that fact once on my blog and this is the second time I’ve put something like this in a comment.
AND you know what??? I haven’t put my number up on my site yet. “What if someone creepy calls me?”
So, I’m off to do that now. Stop by…. maybe give me a call!
Cheerss!
Toby Martini
813.966.0990
Fantastic way to think about it – network versus audience.
I’m gonna ponder this for a while.
You get 800 per day!! Holy Cow, that must be an utter nightmare.
How about scrapping email contact (except for the Ninjas) and set up a forum? You would still be helping people feel heard, most the time other people answer the questions for you. Occasionally you answer, everybody’s happy?
The IttyBiz forum would provide a supportive community where all your readers get together – you charge a small monthly fee – Third Tribe will be too expensive for most Ittybiz owners next time they open their doors… (your forum would be much cooler anyway!).
Bye bye email, hello extra income ;o)
yeah, u r right.
There is no point being guilty, we all know that, but we still feel guilty. strange world, isn’t it?
I am really surprised to know the amount of emails you get daily, thats really huge.
I love my regular dose of reality from Naomi.
Thank you. Nothing further, your honor.
You didn’t mention speaking – I speak at LOTS of events a year and give out my blog address and sometimes my email. Gotta say I have gotten great opportunities from that and am bumping up on the 800 emails a day. My “real” friends know that if they don’t hear from me in a couple of days to call or resend the email and that it doesn’t mean I hate them, just that I am overwhelmed right now!
Hey Naomi,
What a refreshing post :)
Thank you for your sincerity and no BS attitude. This is why I light up when your name pops up in my inbox.
Thank you.
Conor
A courageous post
The frothing masses rush past
Fearful of truth’s sting
(Haiku)
What’s not to love about a post entitled “You’re not a bad person and you’re not doing it wrong”? Damn straight.
It can feel crushing at times. And I’m nowhere near the numbers you’ve cited…even in the theoretical exercise.
Thank you for shouting it out for us all.
Thanks, Naomi. An eloquent reminder of Dunbar’s number, which seems to hold quite true for most of us.
Oh right. Human beings are NOT scalable. Doh!
I long for the day when I will have this problem, Naomi. Ever the optimist, I’ll bookmark this post so that I can refer back to it when I start feeling guilty about not maintaining a personal connection with my followers.
The whole point of social media is to expand your reach to people who otherwise wouldn’t have found you. It is presented as a two-way medium, but anyone in your position quickly hits a tipping point where that isn’t sustainable.
I’m just glad to have the one-way communication coming from you: keep up the good work!
Loved it Naomi. Thank you x
I find that in my constant attempts to stay connected with others, I’m not making any money! It’s very frustrating and I’m drawing the line. Work first, interconnectivity when I get a moment.
My biz is about making money, first and foremost – not getting some high school ego stroked by having a trillion friends and followers.
Thanks for this.
I find that in my constant attempts to stay connected with others, I’m not making any money! It’s very frustrating and I’m drawing the line. Work first, interconnectivity when I get a moment.
My biz is about making money, first and foremost – not getting some high school ego stroked by having a trillion friends and followers.
Thanks for this.
I know this is not the major point of your post – which is terrific, but the fact that we still HAVE “womens magazines,” to say nothing of 5 inch heels, says volumes. I had hoped I would live long enough to see both go the way of the ironing board, but it appears not. Sigh.
i spend half my time thinking gah! too many people wanting too much from me!
and then i catch up and start thinking gah! where the hell are all the people? somebody please come buy something! or ask for a custom order! it’s been 2 days since my last sale – nobody’s ever going to buy anything ever again!
i love my ittybiz, i hate the fucking rollercoaster.
my house is a wreck & all i ever do is work. and i have to keep doing this – especially since my husband lost his job last month. and i have to keep this happy face on and not tell anyone because i don’t want anyone to buy my stuff because they feel sorry for me.
God, that feels good to say.
If it makes you feel better, I know exactly how you feel. If you ever want to talk, feel free to email me. Sometimes having someone in the same situation to help the stress really helps.
I love you for writing this (and for other stuff, too, dontchaknow?)
I saw myself heading in this direction many moons ago–too many people wanting a piece of me, and no time for myself–and decided that the ONLY path out of it was to create a business that was bigger than I.
It scared the crap out of me to think that other people would take care of people for me and help build relationships with my company–with my work. But I put good systems and people in place, and holding my breath, stepped back.
That was about ten years ago. And my biggest genuine concern–that people would be unhappy to no longer have immediate and direct access to me–turned out to be unfounded. People were happy because they got answers to questions and the help they wanted much faster than I ever could have managed to give them. More, they no longer expected direct access to me. And once that expectation was handled, things got easier by orders of magnitude.
Will I ever be you, or Brogan, or Godin, or Vaynerchuk? Maybe not. But I don’t aspire to working it the way you guys appear to. And all the money in all the world isn’t worth what I’d give up to make working that way happen.
Choices. We all have them to make, yanno?
I’m genuinely happy. My business has continued to thrive. I take time away from work easily and often (including not working the last quarter of the year), and it’s allowed me to actually focus on the relationships I choose to focus on (including those created through Twitter, FB, LI, my blogs, networking, etc) , while continuing to live life off the gerbil wheel.
Great post – and something that I’ve been pondering too. I follow 13 people on twitter. You could possibly divide the groups into the following: 5 never tweet and 3 tweet multiple times per day. I just about manage to keep up with them all and I’ve been feeling guilty that I need to “follow more”…
It is content, content, content…
Hard to say, but this might be my favorite thing you’ve ever written.
I’m at an average of about 100 emails per day, and if you’re a nobody, then I’m a lepton.
That was my two sentences, but since that’s not enough I’d like to add that you are 100%.
The whole things is overwhelming some days and I just need to go to the mountains and away from internet access and get back into balance.
There is just no way to stay in touch with all those people- even if they are amazing- they get lost in the pile. I have met some really cool people on Twitter and then the next week I forget who they were and how to find them again.
Just keep breathing. ah..
Naomi…fantastic post!
That’s the problem that I’ve had with Twitter…somewhere / somewhen I’m convinced that I’ve missed the key detail to help my business actually grow during the free-flowing back and forth from all the great minds out there.
And I’ve missed it.
I can’t even imagine 800 emails per day! I was actually talking about this with my boyfriend Robin and he gets maybe 1 email per day (usually from me or other “real life” friends). And it’s totally different when you’re trying to connect with all these people.
I love that you brought up the “finding time for yourself, your family, making dinner”… gah it’s SO true!
Thank you thank you thank you! I’m so sick of the “You’re doing it wrong” crap out there. There is no right. There has to be a shift in all this connecting. It’s gotten out of hand.
THANK YOU!!!!! (does 2 words beat two sentences?)
F*** this is awesome. And by “awesome” I mean — stuff needs to change.
Thank you!
Allison
I rarely have enough time to get back to all of my incoming emails, but somehow I always have time to read your new posts…
Go figure.
Thanks! I feel so terse when I fire back short pithy emails.
Though I will never, never skip punctuation. My HS English teacher would come back and haunt me!
Thanks! I needed this as I tried to figure out Tweetdeck and Google Buzz at the same time I’m trying to be a father, husband, coach, and start-up guy.
*applause*
That is all.
Yikes… I’m breathing again. And posting about you and Carson who pointed me here… and then I’m going back to work. My work, not social media work… thanks
Holy wow, Batman! That rocked my world just now.
Smart and on target. Thank you!
It is also near-impossible to provide thoughtful nuance in tweets/buzz/fill-in-the-blank unless you’re doing an awful lot of it at the expense of everything else. I miss thoughtful nuance. And I don’t want to miss everything else.
The time sink aspects of social media are why 1) I don’t auto-follow, 2) I don’t seek out followers or connections as though it were a point-driven arcade game, and 3) I desperately try to limit my time on social media, with about as much success as my parents had in trying to limit my childhood time on television.
When I was a kid, I excitedly waited for the daily mail delivery because I might get something interesting. Now, I fear the daily electronic delivery — because there might be something that demands more of my time than I have to give.
You totally forgot about GTD. Not only do you have to have RELATIONSHIPS with all these people you also have to have a ZERO IN BOX. Jesus, we need a miracle. And really, I don’t know about you, but I have stuff I have to actually do to get paid. Thanks for taking the pressure off.
HAHAHAHAHAAH!!! I don’t even have a real business yet and my inbox is over 400. I can’t remember the last time it was less than that.
Aren’t we all just tired of being told everything we’re doing wrong? I get paralyzed by it and start to think maybe I’ll go work in a shop.
Thank you so much for this! In the past week I have started to feel overwhelmed with hearing how I am blogging/tweeting/facebooking/marketing WRONG. And if I would just try a little harder and be more “authentic” and buy this workshop then I could be doing it RIGHT and then not only could I be a bajillionaire, but everyone would think that I’m super cool, too.
Thank you for giving me permission to just try my best and let that be enough! :)
Here’s the thing, though. I don’t NEED personal contact for your products & blog to work for me. I like your shit. It’s helping me grow my business.
Yeah, a Festivus card and a martini together would be smashing, but we’ve got lives to lead here.
My email box is so terrifying that even trying to figure out how to outsource it makes me want to drown my sorrows in chocolate cake and Jack Daniels.
– Sonia, in Paris, hiding from her email
Like in the physical world, we pick and choose who we make close friends with. We have to. Someone has to stand out for us to gain our attention. It doesn’t mean we hate the rest. Friendship is not a completely random event.
Kara J nailed it, social media is best suited for networking at first, an audience later.
Thanks, Naomie, for airing this.
Wow, just an awesome post Naomi…you have definitely earned a new subscriber. And by the way, DON’T even worry about getting in “touch” with me, I think we all understand that most people are busy and those who take things the wrong way when they don’t get responded back to, are honestly, a little insecure.
I’m at the point in my own business where I can respond to 95% of the people. It all really comes down to doing your best and getting back with as many people as you can. For god sake, you’re only human. And also, even though we can’t build relationships with everyone who comes into our funnel or whatever you want to call it, as long as we’re still building at least a few new relationships each day, that’s what really matters.
By the way Naomi, what’s “Ponderous”? You mean “Posterous”, right? ;-)
Yup. I totally meant Posterous. Either that or I have secret plans to create a new social network.
I’ll never tell. :)
To make sure your new super-secret social network fits the current model, you must name it either “preposterous – completely contrary to nature, reason, or common sense; absurd; senseless; utterly foolish)” or “preponderous — having great amount, heaviness, or number; having much superiority (imagined or otherwise).”
You can thank me in a poorly punctuated, two-sentence email. When you find the time. Thanks for the post, been missing your wit.
“completely contrary to nature, reason, or common sense”
DING DING DING. And we have a winner, kids.
This lurker was moved to say “thanks” for articulating a fear that appears to plague many of us. Is there anything harder than self-forgiveness? Glad I’m not alone.
Cheers,
Alexa
You had me at hello — the post title is all I really needed to hear today.
But your take on the system is f-ing great. And thanks for letting all of us who aren’t there yet off the hook in advance!
Ha! And here was I, about to send you a quick e-mail to thank you for the brilliant call we had yesterday (because yes, I paid for it, and all, but I paid SO MUCH LESS than your hourly rate that I still feel kind of shocked). For the record, it rocked, and set off all kinds of lovely fireworks, and I feel as though I’m going places.
Maybe I’ll just send it in my head – mental-mail, or M-mail, if you will. That would save time for everyone, yes? Yes.
Amen and Thank you! I “dropped out” for a while from blogging because I couldn’t keep up with all the contacts and delicious new info to read. I thought I was “doing it wrong.” It was and still is completely overwhelming.
But, I’m starting anew, and I guess I’m now going “do my best” and try not to feel guilty when I fall short of perfect (LOL- that’s a joke cause we all know that is not at all possible)
My family is my priority. I love my online & blogging buddies, but I have to make my family first. I’ll drop in for updates with the rest when time allows.
It’s frustrating. I don’t want to outsource email, but between blog updates, inquiries, affiliate stuff, and personal stuff, it’s becoming unmanageable. I do OK with social media, but I think the problem lies not in the medium, but in the model.
It’s important to build a business that scales, whether it’s online or off, and those that forget this fact will really struggle when things start to take off.
I just adore you and how willing you are to tell he truth about the hard stuff that we are all feeling but is often so hard to articulate. Reading this just made me relax and breathe out a huge sigh of relief. It’s so easy to feel inadequate trying to keep up with all the potential for connection and fans and opportunities to do our work in the world that social media promises. But at a certain point it becomes pure madness trying to keep up with it all. And it’s such a good thing to be reminded that it’s crazy to even try!
Thanks darlin’…. you’re the best *Mwah*
I agree that two sentences in an email is more than enough for 90% of emails. There is nothing worse than an email that says the same thing 5 times – but in a slightly different way each time. Get to the point – I like it!
I am not going to feel bad for not getting 20-100 new twitter followers a day, or more comments on my blog – because I can actually deal with the small amount of time it takes to keep it going. I don’t think I would like getting overwhelmed by it all.
I like this candid post about being impossible to do everything at once, such as connecting with every person we come across when blogging. It’s kind of different from what I’ve been reading for the last 4 to 5 hours. Thanks for sharing these thoughts!
As usual perceptive, funny, and the truth. Love it. If any of your readers are feeling depressed because of this here is an article that may help them http://tr.im/OuxN
I was going to reply to your excellently written post but much to my chagrin I checked and don’t actually have time to do so.
Sorry. :)
You could not have written this at a better time for me. I don’t have a head for math but common sense keeps telling me that there’s no way this social media thing could work over the long haul. You mean I’m actually RIGHT about that?! Hell, I just spent a half hour reading your post and all the comments, and someone posted a link and I gotta go there too and check it out and on and on and on and it’s midnight already…what happened? Thank you, thank you, thank you (OK, that’s redundant, extra reading time, sorry)
All of these comments are like a huge collective sigh of relief, to which I’m contributing. Ahhhhhh. Thanks for the straight talk, Naomi.
Heard the story about the girl on the beach?
This guy’s walking down the beach and see’s a girl standing in the middle a what seems to be hundreds of starfish that have washed up on the sand. She’s frantically picking them up and throwing them back into the sea one at a time.
The guy walks over to her and says “What are you doing? You can’t possibly save all of these!“. The girl bends down, picks up another starfish and throws it back into the water with all her strength, then turns back to the man and says,
“I made a difference to that one.“
Steve, I really like this. I’m going to use it, live it.
The thing about this post is that I smell frustration with no solution. There is no neat conclusion reached at the end. The system is broken; it’s fucked up and we can’t deal with it… so… ?
Someone tell me what the answer is. I can’t believe I’m being forced to think for myself here.
Johnny – That’s exactly what I was thinking too.
I think we’re all going to eventually get overwhelmed and frustrated and just give up. It’s just not sustainable. I’m feeling the overwhelm lately myself although I have nowhere near 800 emails a day. I wince when I accidentally send out one that’s not grammatically correct or whatever because I’m in a rush. But what can you do?
Just do our best until something better comes along, I suppose.
Here.
Right here is where some enterprising young college person could see our frustration and write the next Napster/Digg/FaceBook/(Preposterous!) app to help us deal with this connection overwhelm.
I like the distinction between your real network and your audience. AND, even people that have a huge audience, still have a separate network of people that they track.
So, how will we get through those 200-1000 emails a day?
Come on you young folks that were lucky enough to grow up with a mouse in your hands, create the next big thing for us that no longer want to (or never did) create applications.
We’ll make you rich!
Cheers!
Toby
Hmm. A problem without a solution is certainly one very big problem.
Having cut and slashed my way through Twitter this evening in a fit of overwhelm pique, I thank Whatever There Is Up There for this post. I needed to read it and my goodness I’ve only just bloody started with this social media stuff *sigh*. So I am a good person after all. Really. The relief is palpable.
Great post and it really did make me think. And this is the thought….I don’t perceive all the people who write the blogs, who say cool stuff, and help me learn as people I have a “relationship” with (wow that sentence is a grammatical nightmare..). They have a business and are kind enough to talk to me as a person when it is my turn in line. If they can’t talk to me personally, someone equally nice gets back to me. That’s all good as far as I am concerned. It’s like a doctor, dentist. They can have 1000s of patients and have a “relationship” of sorts with each, but it isn’t reciprocal, nor is it open-access. Maybe people who started out developing third tribe-type businesses idealized the idea that they could have relationships with everyone who cares to know them. But at the end of the day it is a business and I think most of us understand that bloggers with 25,000 followers are not, in reality, our “friends.”
Excellent post. I feel like I just watched the fight club. lol I love people that totally speak their mind, say it like it is. It’s so true. I can’t even imagine trying to stay connected with that many people. I would feel so overwhelmed. I would feel like I was letting the people down. Bah! I’ll stick to my 100 followers and 20 emails… That’s something I can handle. At least this week!
How have I not found this blog before?
*Loved* this post. It’s brilliant, insightful and funny. And it sums up how I feel even though I’m not even close to your level of “connectedness.” Thanks for writing it.
I love this. I like being reminded of something I fundamentally already know, but need to have pointed out to me over and over. And I like knowing that it’s not just me. In my case, I don’t have 800 emails (yet? still working my way through OBS and the Idea Catalyst Kit). But I do have an ever-filling Google Reader queue on top of which I feel guilt about all the other blogs I’m not reading that I’m not even subscribed to. I know, crazy right?
What this also reinforces is another point you make over and over: that it’s all about the content. Because in that crowded inbox or reader, what makes one thing stand out amongst all that noise? Knowing one of those things is going to be full of really good stuff. So I always click on your posts (and Tom & Lorenzo of Project Rungay; love those boys).
It doesn’t help with the new relationships, but it does reinforce who gets responded to or read after that.
Thanks for your insight. This is an amazing post.
Pure Gold;
(Shhhhhh,now Naomi won’t remember, but she shot me an
email of a few goofy hooligan words, just-for-fun,inimitably
Naomi style, a while ago. It probably took her just a few moments type ‘em,
but I will REMEMBER the gesture for a LONG TIME.
Not really so much about Relationship, but more like Connection, in
an itty bitty way. Were those moments worth it?
They certainly were to ME.)
Naomi,
1) How is your arse? My apologies if I missed an update since your previous post. :)
2) Your contact form doesn’t have a Category pick list. If it did, those of us that need to contact you could help you by specifying:
- Compliment
- Complaint
- Problem, please help
- Which Product Should I Order?
- Idea
- Cool Handbag Alert
- Just an FYI
- Just wanted to say hi!
- Are you still alive?
- Whatever (mine are just examples)
3) With a category, you can start to prioritize things which should help the Ninjas. There are companies in this world that make software for this problem. They normally refer to it as help desk software. I know there are packages available stand-alone like forum software, but I’m not sure if there is a WordPress plug-in option. Generally, this software is called something like help desk software. A quick search in Google yields a few million results but if you are interested, I’m sure that someone smart can whittle down the list more. Example: I know one guy that uses software from http://www.hesk.com but I don’t know if he loves it or hates it.
Just typing out aloud :)
Update: I had asked the person (I mentioned in my previous comment) about his satisfaction with HESK about a month ago but couldn’t find the email until just now. I had asked if he likes HESK and he said, “I like the HESK help desk software, but I think osTicket may be better.” For the record, I don’t have a vested interest in either of these. Just passing it on in hopes that it helps.
Holy shit that’s epic.
So, if you’re someone like me, trying to connect with someone of your level of busy-ness or above, how do you do it? Send an email and follow-up? Mention it on Twitter? Give up and wait for you to find me?
Catherine
Holy shit, why don’t I hang out here more often?
The posts like this are the reason I and everyone else loves you Naomi. You earn the title of Ninja every day.
I’m personally terrible with email. But that’s at least a conscious choice I’ve made so I can actually you know… uhh, do stuff that matters.
Why is it that every time I check in to IttyBiz there’s a post up that puts to paragraph all those ethereal and nagging thoughts I could never find words to express!!?
Thought I’d mention that since recently I had a serious jump in site traffic and as a result I’m having daily conniption fits trying to find the hours necessary to respond.
Every bloody day now I have 15 or 300 new friend requests/followers/whatevers. At least now I know I’m not the only one wondering how to keep up – or rather – realizing that keeping up quickly becomes an impossible task.
I super stoked to find your blog.
Thanks for keeping it real!
I thought the definition of an A-List blogger was someone who can’t possibly respond to all the e-mails and comments and doesn’t even feel they need to try to.
Since I get one more sentence, I’d like to say that right now I get more marketing e-mails from A-List bloggers than I do from my readers (mostly moms who are far too busy to e-mail me).
Having panic attacks just thinking about email. I have not started my blog…yet but it is my goal for this year. What saddens me is there are so many GREAT people to meet and so little time.
Being friends with you Naomi or people who comment here would be awesome. Answering email to make friends? Not high on my list though.
Thanks for the reminder that just doing the blog thing is worth it and for relieving some of the fear.
You are supposed to make choices. That’s why Twitter and blogs are superior to email — you can see what a person is about before decided whether to create a relationship. You don’t just create a relationship with every single person willy-nilly. The ones you’d rather not have a relationship with, those are the ones you give the three words.
And by choosing a backwards technology like email as an example, you’ve filtered out all of the benefits of a model like Twitter and you’ve pretended as if all of this social media enthusiasm should have been happening decades ago. Why only now? It is precisely because of the advantages in managing multiple relationships afforded in technologies like Twitter.
It sounds like you’ve reached the tipping point and have used your network to build an audience.
Social networking has allowed people to leverage their time like never before in history but it is not scalable in it’s purest form.
Excellent post. I was thinking about this today – how in the world do you truly “follow” 1000 peeps on Twitter without going crazy? It’s like drinking water from a firehose. Anyway, I read your post and thought, screw it, you expressed it perfectly, why try to write it all over again on my blog.
Outstanding article – relationships – some real and others simply digital are, at least in my opinion, what make the world go around – that and money. In order to reach your audience to do business people search for other people whoa re reliable and that, at least in part, is what social sites are for – legitimizing people…
My 2 cents…
Incredible article – my favorite part “It’s a broken system. It’s a naive fantasy of hyperconnected utopia. It is a first year economics student discovering communism for the first time.”
I’m a devoted follower Naomi, but I gotta tell ya, it’s 2 to 2 in the 2nd and we’re gonna win! The kids are all over your all-stars!
Yes, I know this has nothing to do with marketing. There are no rules! Pretend this is a Twitter post and I’m confused on the proper social media to choose during this height of excitement!
Go U.S.A.
Minnesota Sidney
Now why would you go and say something like that in my hour of pain?
Here’s a fucking Haiku
You are a goddess.
thank you for absolving me! :-)
This post is perfection. I have given up Life 2.0 (formerly known as Web 2.0) and am systematically unsubscribing as much as possible. I have virtually abandoned my twitter stream, my facebook account and have replaced my time spent chasing down the internet rabbit hole with…cooking. Yes, that is correct. I now cook and it is infinitely more satisfying. Thank you for posting this. It is indeed a giant pyramid scheme.
Interesting perspective, and probably more right than wrong, as I’m more of a nobody than you, and I don’t think I’m doing it wrong or right either, I’m simply doing it. Love the irony of the Gary V comment….
Naomi,
I love this post and I totally agree. It is impossible to keep up with, sleep, raise a family and enjoy life. I am working hard to build my online presence and even with my little bit, it is difficult to keep up and causes me to burn out.
We do our best to respond, build relationships and carry on conversations, but sometimes we miss a person, conversation, reply or need. Sometimes you just have to say to yourself “Here’s to those that understand and those who don’t can go to hell.” Sometimes it just is what it is and life goes on.
Jenn
I get a lot of traffic from social media (blogs especially) which means I comment a lot on peoples blogs. Downside is I get deluged with emails regarding notification updates. Fortunately I can delete most of them quickly. Downside is I have to open them first.
I’m sorry I can’t give a solution here.
I’ve been thinking this a ton lately – am so glad you said it! Duh. So maybe I’m not a Grinch, just realistic.
Finally- this is exactly what I’ve been thinking! I know it’s like “surfing”, but since I can’t possibly keep up with the new currency (“relationships”) I’m turning the all-seeing-eye off and going for a walk.
Hi. I got a bit lost in the math part, but I agree with this post. I think most of us have been taught at a young age to follow the system, that’s why we follow it, not knowing what it’s basis is. But I believe that change is always possible.
I’ve spent such a huge amount of my life looking for a guaranteed “guide to success”.
Your post hits the nail right on the head. You’ve got to stop trusting others and start making your own path.
Thanks!
Splendid rant! Spot on.
It’s always been about quality and not quantity.
Aw hell, Naomi… just when I had a good self loathing going, you up and tell me I’m okay. That’s just gonna ruin the shit out of today. I’d already planned a good depression and chocolate binge, and now I have to stop. Or maybe I’ll just wait till tomorrow for all that. Or maybe on Monday – or the first of the month.
Then again I probably shouldn’t let all that self flagellation go to waste… not to mention the pound and a half of luscious semi-dark chocolate that’s sitting there whispering to me.
So here I am, I’ve been spending half my time answering emails and the other half immobilized by guilt, and now with the guilt gone, and then I find out I don’t even have to answer EVERY one of the emails… well hell… what’ll I do with all that free time? I’m starting to freak out here, Naomi. I don’t know how to be that happy and free!
Oh well, I have the rest of today to indulge myself before swearing off and learning how to get a life.
I spent months arguing and advocating all the things an URL should not be, just so some people can try to tell me that all lifes problems can be solved with a two sentence response? Here’s my one word answer: Wrong.
The fact is I can still be found in the same manners as I could be found on the net 20 years ago, and I’m never going to touch twitter if I can help it.
My take is that you do what you can do until you can’t anymore. If you have problems you can solve in 2 sentence responses, great. But one size never fits all. That is also true for every other method of communication, including forum questions and comments. Just because it seems new doesn’t mean it is, or that you should chase it. There is a lot to be said for finding what works for you, and sticking with those methods.
In the same way that graveyards are filled with indispensable people, spools of tape are filled with indispensable communication. Expect your world to keep moving on no matter what happens to you.
I love in a way that business/marketing is about “relationships” now, which can be a bit more personal and human than just shoving stuff in people’s faces. And yet at the same time you’re right on the money there, a lot of this whole “building relationships” thing is pretty damn fake.
I think better tools would help to a point but only so much, but at least they’d help more than “better rules” like the two sentences thing. If I tried to only do 2 sentences in every response I’d be writing the longest sentences known to mankind.
This reminds me that I’ve tried to be “superwoman” in the past…the best Mom, Wife, friend, sister, daughter and business owner I can be! And, part of being “superwoman” for me is always keeping all my connections happy.
In other words, I’d never want to miss a phone call, email, twitter message, facebook comment…so that I could respond to each and ever one. I’m still doing that willingly and joyfully….however I can see that when my business takes me to the level I’m aiming for…I definitely will need to consider that I won’t feel as connected to my twitter followers and facebook friends; but it’s OK.
Thanks for pointing this out! Love the way you write, Naomi…
Почитал предыдущие комменты, чесно говоря разочеровался.
Много мнений людей, которые не понимают по этой теме ничего.
Предыдущие комментаторы, давайте свяжемся по асе или почте, для обсуждения данного материала
и я готов высказать свою точку зрения
Thank you. I actually exhaled.
Geez. I nearly had a panic attack. Thanks.
You’re absolutely right that no one could possibly keep up with it all. And that doesn’t make anyone a bad person. And they are NOT doing it wrong.
That said, I would like to suggest a partial solution. Comments in blogs. Instead of trying to interact one-on-one provide personal answers but publicly so that everyone else interested in that topic can benefit too.
Instead of answering in Haiku, answer with links to the content you have already written that thoroughly answers the questions asked.
Encourage people to use the comments in your blog instead of emailing and Tweeting and interacting on all those other Social Media sites. That way those who want to know what YOU think about what YOU write will know where to find it.
Yes, it still takes a lot of time. No, you can’t do it instantly when you’re already famous (or even if you’re not). But this IS a partial and highly useful solution.
This is only a partial solution because sometimes answers need to be private. And if there are many you are mentoring then you will also need a private community (which I would make a private blog because I believe discussions in comments are much more time-effective than forums or Social communities like Ning).
Even in the your private group, answers can be provided by linking to the information and then answering what questions are raised. Then improve that information to cover those questions too.
The better the content you already have, the less time it takes to answer and that frees up more time for personal answers.
Interesting perspective
Can I just say that I read this post every few weeks, burst into tears, then feel vastly better? Thank you.
They are really going to take my kumbaya card away, but I have to start having people answer the email. How the combination of so many people I *like* can aggregate to be so scary and misery-making is indeed mysterious.
Maybe I’ll do the Liz Strauss thing and just do an open mike night sometimes. I actually am social when I’m not this overwhelmed.