<H1 BIG>HI TECH -- HI TOUCH</H1>

By Hank Trisler

John Nesbitt, in his ground-breaking, but old book Megatrends put forth the idea that as technology advanced and caused us to become more separated from one another, the need for courtesy and caring would be ever more important. What John feared most has come upon us.

A prime example of alienation would be Twitter, where we not only cannot see one another, our ability to converse with one another is restricted to 140 characters. This makes communication real tough.

A couple of days ago a very nice man posted something odd on Twitter. He said that thanking someone for a retweet was the same as spam and if someone did that to him, he would unfollow them. I've watched this fellow's tweets for a few months and find him to be a thoughtful, articulate and considerate individual. Why, then, would he engage in such boorish behavior? In subsequent tweets he explained that it was merely the pressure of time. He had built his following to the point that he had 500 retweets a DAY. If he thanked all those people, there would be no time for other business. Oh, there were other reasons, but the central issue was he was just too busy to be polite.

DANGER, WILL ROBINSON. There be demons out yonder. People tend to repeat those acts which are appreciated and ignore those acts which are not. If I retweet you a couple of times and you fail to mention it, I'll find other things to do with my time. My response to discourteous behavior, is to avoid the offending party and I'm not alone in this regard. If someone does something nice for you, you thank them. It's just good, common sense and courtesy.

A very bright lady with the moniker of @mediaphyter tweeted this morning that someone who had guested on her blog had sent her a HAND-WRITTEN thank you note. She was very favorably impressed, as well she might be. Hand-written notes are as frequently encountered as buggy whips. The higher postage prices go and the more ubiquitous electronic communication becomes, the more rare the hand-written note is. If you send notes to people who do things for you, you will stand out from the crowd.

In this increasingly competitive marketplace, I'm going to suggest you can gain a substantial advantage over your competition by merely being grateful and expressing that gratitude at every opportunity.