There’s two things I don’t like when it comes to business advice: 1) wishy-washy advice, and 2) clickbaity titles.
…Aaand this post has both! 😂 Sorry.
On the plus side, I’ll get straight to the point with what the actual advice is.
Your superpower… 🦸♀️
There’s something I think a lot of freelancers are guilty of (myself included, especially years ago) that – with a little change – could make a big difference in how you’re perceived and how your networking efforts will go.
Are you ready? Drumroll please… 🥁
Your biggest superpower as a freelancer when it comes to networking is…
To be nice as much as possible. Or to be positive as much as possible. Or, y’know, both.
Similarly, avoid negativity where and when you can.
And that’s it! You can close this post now (actually don’t, please…) 🤣😩
There can often be so much negativity, hatred, nastiness, etc. in the networking world (especially on social media), which I put into two categories: 1) moaning, and 2) putting others down.
The woes of moaning 😫
If the majority of your social media content is a moan, then I guarantee you that – at best – people are ignoring/overlooking your content as a whole, or – at worst – they’re simply muting/unfollowing you.
It’s so easy nowadays to moan. Bad service from BT,* for example? You can put out a tweet berating them. Boom!
(* BT is a UK telephone service provider, for any non-UK readers who don’t know – I’m only using them as an example because I’ve been having the worst experience with them recently…)
I think a little bit of moaning is okay. It’s probably healthy – to get rid of that pent-up frustation and releasing it, so you can take a breath and move on from it.
Yet some people take it to the extreme. Most or all of their social media content is a moan, or a complaint, or a gripe.
I’m going to come out and say it: if the majority of your social media content is a moan, then I guarantee you that – at best – people are ignoring/overlooking your content as a whole, or – at worst – they’re simply muting/unfollowing you.
How do I know that? Because it’s what I do when I see constantly moany content. 😱
The downer of putting others down 😠👉😮
[When you put others down], it can… look quite nasty. It can even look a little arrogant. Because when you put others down, it looks as though you’re saying you’re better.
This is when someone berates or complains about someone else’s work.
I see it a lot in copywriting circles (sorry to pick on you, copywriters!), whereby someone will share an example of bad copy out in the wild, and loads of copywriters will dogpile on it and make fun of it. SEOs (my line of work) are guilty of it too, albeit I see a lot less of it these days compared to 5-10 years ago.
Sometimes, it can actually be a good thing. It can be a learning experience (i.e. don’t do what they did). But it can also look quite nasty. It can even look a little arrogant. Because when you put others down, it looks as though you’re saying you’re better. And heck, you might be! But in my opinion, it’s never a good look if you yourself make out that you’re better than others (the utopian idea being that other people make out that you’re good at what you do instead).
It might not even be someone else’s work that gets criticised. It could be the way they go about freelancing, or the way they use LinkedIn, etc. (both of which are examples I see a lot). Or even a freelancer complaining about the clients or prospects they deal with.
Why it matters
We often talk about ‘red flags’ when dealing with clients – this is almost like a red flag when choosing to work with (or pass work onto) a fellow freelancer…
It matters because there are times when I think about passing work onto someone, but if they’re constantly moaning and/or constantly putting others down, then it gives me second thoughts.
If they’re the type that moans about bad clients publicly, then what if they moan about the client I might be passing onto them?
What if they moan about the work?
Or what if they moan about the people they’re working with, including me?! (That might be why I’m passing the work onto them in the first place, after all – because I’m involved with the project, too.)
I can’t be bothered with any of that. I’d rather pass the work onto someone who doesn’t present themselves that way – even if the moaner/putter-downer is arguably a better fit for the project in question.
We often talk about ‘red flags’ when dealing with clients – this is almost like a red flag when choosing to work with (or pass work onto) a fellow freelancer… 😬
Speaking from experience 😅
Of course, it goes without saying that I have never ever moaned or put others down… 😇
…
🤣🤣🤣
Yeah… That’s utter nonsense.
I certainly don’t come from a place of superiority while I preach this…
Many years ago, I used to moan so much on Twitter that a friend of a friend unfollowed me, and told our mutual friend that she unfollowed me because I moaned too much! 😆
I mean, the very first line of this post was: “There’s two things I don’t like…” 😂
And as for putting others down… It’s funny because I was going to use an example from a recent fantasy writing conference I went to, where people on a panel were complaining about other people’s bad writing (eurgh…). But since then (and it’s literally only been less than two weeks), I published a post on here complaining about and low-key mocking someone who thought a networking 1-to-1 meeting was an opportunity to sell to me. And I took part in a webinar that same week all about audiobooks, where I shared an anecdote of a badly-narrated audiobook… 😅
That’s why – at the beginning of this post – I said to “be nice/positive as much as possible.” Originally, it was just going to be “be nice/positive” – with nothing after it. But I’m sure you’ll agree that it’s pretty much impossible not to do it a little bit. Sometimes the best points can be made from failures. Admittedly, pointing out our own failures is best (they’re first-hand that way as well – we ‘lived’ them), but if that can’t be done, then unfortunately, we may have to lean onto the failures of others to help make our point.
…But if you can do that as little as possible, then that’s a plus.
Over the last few years, I’ve tried to make a concerted effort to try to be as nice and positive as possible. And you know what? I feel better for it. That’s just an added bonus of knowing that my anti-moaning might be helping to win me work, too.
A quick note on privilege…
I should also point out that I’m a white, straight, middle-class, thirty-something man from a first-world country. I’m well aware of my privilege (I’ve been meaning to write a blog post all about privilege actually, about how to understand having privilege vs those who don’t – if I ever do, I’ll probably put it on my personal Medium blog than on here).
Originally, an older version of this post was going to make the point that you should also try to avoid being political online / via social media (or in person as well I guess, but it’s much easier to do it online) – but that’s an incredibly privileged take.
Because if I were a woman, I might want to complain about things that are sexist and/or misogynistic. Or if I were non-white, I might want to complain about things that are racist. Or if I were LGBTQ+… And so on.
It’s so easy for me to say “don’t complain” or “don’t be negative” when – unfortunately – some things in life have to be said or fought against.
So I just wanted to make that point quickly as well. If you need to fight the good fight, then do it. ✊ That’s the exception as far as I’m concerned.
Minimise the moans & put down the put-downs
So, to summarise: if you can, try to be positive and nice as much as possible. Avoid negativity, avoid moaning, avoid putting others down.
Because when it comes to networking and personal branding, positivity (or lack of negativity) is one helluva superpower. 💪
