It’s A Small World After All…

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and social media keeps making it smaller

Disney got it right- it’s a small world after all. There might be 7 continents, 7 seas and 7 billion people in the world but we are all more connected than we think. A 2012 study by the University of Milan and Facebook revealed that any two strangers have at least 4.7 people in common. This means that you and a complete random “stranger” are connected by almost 5 different people.

This connection is even more accountable than before thanks to social media sites. Facebook allows you to search people, view their friends, and even seek friends in common. Facebook also lets you search and join different networks that serve as intranet communities; Instagram and Twitter allow you to view other people’s followers and whom they are following, as well as which of these people you are following; LinkedIn helps you establish connections in the social business world, and so on and so forth. All these major social media sites make these connections even clearer and help you connect the dots between you and a stranger.

So what does all this really mean? Here’s where your networking and communication skills must be put in good use. Once you find some common ground with a person, (whether it is mutual friends, that you graduated from the same university, or that you worked in the same city) then you start to build a connection with them. Although you might not know the person, you are no longer complete strangers because there is a common bond between the two of you.

And that’s not all. Once you establish the missing link, you can take it to the next level by starting to build a relationship with the person. If you use the different social media sites to stay in touch and keep up with these people, then you start to form connections all over the country, even all over the world! You never know when these connections might come in handy-both in the business world and in the personal space. Now you can think of the world as a small, limitless, interconnected space where you can take advantage of the social media to help meet personal and professional goals.

 

Estrada Hirsch
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