Comments on: [This person] indicated they did not know you

By: Eric Hwang

Eric Hwang — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 17:53:54 +0000

Without getting too specific, this person is someone who represents not just a few wineries, but an entire region–an area on which I have blogged frequently. As someone now working for a group of wineries, I see firsthand the impact that social networking has on marketing, brand recognition and ultimately sales. I hate to think of how many opportunities that wineries in this area may have missed because of this kind of short-sighted thinking.

The great thing about most social networking sites is that you can choose later to disconnect, unfriend or otherwise stop following people without announcing this to the world, or more specifically, to the person you stopped following. Unless they are using some app to keep tabs on this, there are no hurt feelings like in this case.

By: Walid Romaya

Walid Romaya — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 17:00:40 +0000

I cannot explain this to you other than it is their loss and maybe it has something to do with old PR practices where PR people build out themselves as gatekeepers. I had an experience recently with an in house PR person in Napa for a large sparkling wine operation. I visited the winery as part of an organized visit put up by the winery for wine bloggers. The PR person was telling us how much they get the social networking and that’s why they were reaching out to us wine bloggers. A few weeks later I contacted the same PR person to arrange for a video shoot with the winemaker and she simply shut us down asking particulars as to who we were, what is our audience, traffic etc. She went on to say that she did not want us to “bother” and “stress out” the winemaker. I simply dialed the next large sparkling wine operation in Napa and was immediately given access to the winemaker and we shot the segment. Who is the loser? I do not think it is us!!

By: Ryan Reichert

Ryan Reichert — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 16:49:19 +0000

Eric – I’ve had to use that option myself a couple times. But I’m pretty specific about who I use it for. Not that people are banging down my LinkedIn “door” but when I get a request, I always check that person out. If they’re in the wine business then sure, I’ll add them.

However given my profile also shows my other work (in the recruitment industry, though I’m not a recruiter) I get a lot of people who want to connect that are “build the biggest network of people I don’t know” folks. These are usually easy to spot though.

So to answer your question, I guess outright ignoring an offer to connect from someone that is relevant to your world doesn’t make any sense. Though to that extent, perhaps LinkedIn should have a better option than “I don’t know this person” … maybe “I don’t know this person, but would like to connect tentatively because perhaps we SHOULD know one another.” Should we contact LinkedIn? Cheers

By: Chris @ Wine a Day

Chris @ Wine a Day — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 13:56:39 +0000

Nice piece! I also very rarely decline a contact on many of these sites. I haven’t used Linked in that much recently. I may have to have a look at it again.

Your potential friend is the one who misses out though. He is probably busy looking at the pictures of naked women that you declined:-)