WHAT’S THE BEST WAY TO GET IN TOUCH WITH PEOPLE?

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We checked into the condominium in Destin.  I looked around & realized I couldn’t find the phone.  I yelled to my wife & she said, “There’s no need for a phone, everyone has a cell.”  Oh my goodness, she was right.  No one was probably using the land line anyway.

For some reason, this really made an impression on me.  I don’t know why I should have been so surprised.  I just read an article that 25% of American households don’t have land lines & that number is growing rapidly.

Things used to be so much simpler.  If you wanted to communicate with a friend or business acquaintance you either called them or sent them a postcard or a letter. 

Now the options seem to be unlimited.  Some people prefer to communicate by land line, others cell.  Some prefer Facebook, others Twitter.  Some by e-mail others prefer to text. 

And if you have teenagers, you know how they communicate.  The Pew Research Center recently found half of American teenagers send fifty or more text messages a day & one third send more than a hundred a day—that’s over 3,000 text messages a month.  And now teens have video chat…I’m not sure I even know what that is.

According to a New York Times article, the Kaiser Family Foundation reported American children & teenagers spend an average of 7 ½ hours a day using some sort of electronic device…smart phones, MP3 players or computers.

I have friends who walk around with their Blackberries & will respond almost instantly.  Others never respond to my e-mails at all.

To maximize business & personal relationships, not only do you have to know people’s likes & dislikes, but it’s now imperative to know how they want to communicate.

This is David Sher, your WeMentor guy, saying it’s not what you know, but Whoo you know.