How to be my (LinkedIn) friend

I’m easy. I make friends with almost anybody. Of course, we have to have something in common.

I have 4,240 LinkedIn connections. That’s probably not unusual for somebody who has been in the working world for 46 years.

I don’t seek out people on LinkedIn. But I get a lot of inbound requests. I don’t pay too much attention to the heartfelt notes people write. My question is, “Is this someone who is valuable to be connected to?”

And I put a total of 10 seconds into that evaluation.

I accept that invitation if:

• We worked together (as colleagues or if they were a client)
• We met a conference or elsewhere.
• You are a nonfiction writer, editor, ghostwriter, publisher, agent, or publicist.
• You want to write a nonfiction book.
• You post interesting things on LinkedIn (I check).
• You come recommended by someone I know.

If you don’t fit that description, I probably won’t connect. No judgment, it’s just that we probably don’t have that much useful to say to each other. If you’re a tech vendor who looks like they’re trying to sell stuff to me, a person with an unprofessionally seductive female profile picture and an unlikely or missing set of jobs, or somebody with no profile picture at all, I won’t connect (and depending on the message you sent, I may block you).

What about that LinkedIn description?

Part of my 10-second judgment is your short LinkedIn description. This is most effective when it matches what Steve Woodruff calls a “memory dart” — a few words that tell your story.

My description is “I help nonfiction authors succeed.” That is the whole thing. If you want that, I’m the guy to connect with. If you don’t, go do something else, that’s fine with me.

It does not reflect my years as an analyst, my knowledge of the publishing industry, my background in startups, or my graduate work in mathematics. You aren’t going to connect with me because of those things. You are going to connect with me because I help nonfiction authors succeed.

I despise these description with five or seven different roles separated by the pipe symbol (|). If you are seven different things I don’t know who you are. I don’t have time to read a whole list and see if one of them seems interesting. If you are ten fractional things I don’t think I’m the right connection for you.

If you want to connect with me I’d like to know who you are. A writer. An editor. An analyst. A VP of operations for pharmaceutical companies. An AI expert. An full-stack software developer who writes speculative novels.

If you can’t tell me who you are, why would I want to know you?

And for lord’s sake don’t write stuff like this:

I’m not interested in agencies, scaling, strategies, or content optimization. And I’m not interested in people who do things “via” other things. Just tell me what you do.

I’m a curmudgeon, I know. Maybe my description should read:

Author | Editor | Ghostwriter | Blogger | Curmudgeon | Failed standup comic

Nah, I think I’ll keep it the way it is.