Since my early days of social media, I have been telling people what close bonds I have created with people who in many cases, I have never met face to face.
I have met clients, made friends and even met my own love: Morriss, via social media. There is something very powerful that can happen when you share yourself with others and it can truly change your life. I know my engagement with people on Twitter especially, has changed mine.
One of the first people that I got to know via social media was a guy named Clint Miller. Clint is a real estate lead generation specialist from Montana. He is a down and dirty, tell it like it is, REALLY real person. His genuine spirit shines through his writing on his blog, his Facebook statuses and his Tweets. I have spoken with Clint on the phone several times, but we have never met face to face.
He checks on me when I get quiet online (including once when my cat was stepping on my keyboard while I was out and sending odd tweets) and is a person that I count as a true friend.
Well, Clint has been dealing with some really bad stuff lately as he battles cancer and many of us have been wondering what we could do to help him in this difficult time. My friend Diane Haley Brooks asked Clint what he needed and his main concern was being able to Skype with his young boys while he was away for extended periods undergoing treatments.
Diane reached out to a group of us known as the TwitterQueens to see if we thought we could get enough people to contribute towards and iPad for Clint. A group of amazing people came to the front including: Diane Guercio, Debbie Kirkland, Chris Griffith, Amy Cesario, Kappy Mann, Cyndee Haydon, Audrey June-Forshey and myself.
We spent some time planning and shooting video for Clint (which Diane Guercio edited into a beautiful tribute) and then clicked send on the iPad. Clint received it yesterday and it was like Christmas for us! He was pretty excited, too!
I take the time to share this with you so that you understand the real power of social media…the potential for good and giving that exists in a way that never has before. My friend Diane Guercio said that she loves the fact that we live now because 30 years ago we probably wouldn’t know each other…isn’t that amazing?
I leave you today with a challenge:
Go onto Facebook or Twitter and say something nice to someone just because. See if someone seems sad and send them a private pick me up message. Offer to help, share a smile, be there and be open. Let me know what amazing things happen to you!
Little did I know that my curiosity of how other Realtors were using social media to grow their businesses and market properties would lead me down a path that changed my life in many ways. It became evident in a short time, that I would gain much more than business knowledge. The MOST valuable lesson of all, is that that was initiated in 72 characters or less, or as an “update” on a status page. As I began to engage, to dig deeper into the lives of the REAL people on the other end of cyberspace, what I found was more similarities that I imagined. Not much different than my regional friends and lifelong acquaintances were now people that were soon to become as much a part of my life as all others, and in some ways on even deeper levels. Daily communications or “touches” during a week brought on by sharing the most important news, the most pressing challenges, the funniest moments that got us through our days all laid a foundation for relationships built on familiar circumstance. The ability to have had the face to face meetings that have ensued over the past few years drew us even closer. The ones that struggle, and that we have not met, can feel the power in all that is given from the heart. The needs, met by the many, are more powerful than anyone will ever realize. #WeLoveClint and we remain,…friends.
Thank you for helping Clint. I met him on twitter. I am dealing with cancer also and he took the time to send me tweet. You are right, you meet nice people.