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A Connection Without A Relationship Is A Statistic

I couldn’t take it anymore. I felt like I was going to snap every morning when I saw it. Things would be going OK until I turned it on and then I felt myself turning into The Incredible Hulk ready to smash things.

It was LinkedIn. The platform that was and is perfect for the people I interact with professionally is great. But my feed was getting dominated by a freak show of 4 kinds of people.

The 1st kind loved to brag about their Connection counts.

“I got my 10,000th Connection!”
“Honored and humbled to get my 20,000th Connection!
“Ask me how I got to 25,000 Connections!”

On top of it, I’d see the 2nd kind of person who loved to brag about their awards, their milestones, their fun team building events, etc. Whee. Good. For. YOU.

I’d see the 3rd kind of person performing the Connect N’ Pitch: Connecting to you and then selling you hard on their product or service almost immediately. Seriously, do any of these people ever bother to visit our company websites or LinkedIn Profile in-depth? No? Thought so.

Finally, the 4th kind of person was the annoying lecturer who told everybody that whatever it was they were doing, they were doing it wrong. I’ve fallen into this category before, just to show you that nobody’s perfect.

What all of this behavior has in common is that it’s 1-Way Broadcasting. There’s no difference between this and posting an advertisement. It’s a waterfall of I’m Awesome, You’re Not And Here’s Why You Should Hire Me To Fix It.

People out there are Connecting but they aren’t really CONNECTING. It’s all a game to ramp up statistics and paint this artificial picture of being an “Influencer.” The bigger the audience, the better the opportunity to broadcast to that audience. But the conversation, if you can even call it that, only flows one way. The actual engagement is few and far between.

Surprisingly, I thought there was something missing from this experience.

So, rather than bitch and moan about it, I’ve created a private community designed to actually do something about it.

Hence, The Exceptional Tribe was born.

Everybody on this platform is here because they want to do something more with other professionals beyond a first layer of Connecting or second layer of being an Acquaintance.

Seriously, if you’re here solely to promote the shit out of yourself and your company without trying to:

1) Get smarter about marketing or business development?

2) Grow closer to other people who you might ultimately find to be strategic partners, referral partners, close colleagues, group allies, client champions, mentors or coaches?

Have a nice day. Seriously. You can go now. This is not for you. I’ll wait for you to head out.

Still here and with us? Awesome.

The Exceptional Tribe is a place where people are here to do more than Connect.

I don’t believe you need 10,000 Connections when you can have 50, 75, even 120 maximum who you have real relationships with. Through community, content, coaching and courses, we’ve created multiple paths here in The Exceptional Tribe where you can feel emotionally rewarded from one destination like nowhere else you’ve ever been. And you don’t even have to wake up early and drag yourself along a busy road to get to it.

I can’t wait to learn more about your story, understand your goals and support you with insights, introductions and an ear to listen through all the peaks and valleys you encounter. This may be the social part of social media as its finest.

If we’ve done our job well at The Exceptional Tribe, you’ll look at each Connection you make, here and elsewhere, as not the endgame but merely the beginning of a conversation that ultimately leads to the most important of metrics – the number of relationships you have.