Thread by @chrishlad

A college kid's guide to building a legit network:

Phase 1: Meet a lot of people

Do this in 3 ways:

1) Podcast

2) Cold Outreach

3) Content Creation

1) Start a podcast

Hard: Convince a busy, successful person to get coffee with you.

Easier: Convince them to go on your podcast.

A hidden benefit: Learning how to ask great questions

2) Send cold DMs/emails to people doing cool stuff

Follow the SSS formula:

• SHORT = keep it under 5 lines

• SPECIFIC to the person + their work

• SPACING = no one reads big blocks of text

3) Content Creation

Every tweet is a cold email to the most interesting people in the world.

You never know who's reading.

Or who will reach out.

Phase 2: Narrow Your Focus

You've now met 100 people.

You've sent emails, DMs, hopped on Zooms and recorded podcasts.

Now make a master list of everyone you met and ask yourself 2 questions:

1) "Is this person a force of nature?"

2) Did I get energy talking to them?

h/t @sama

If both answers are Yes, put these people on a personal Board of Directors.

Your Board of Directors = mentors and peers

Seek 20 deep relationships over 100 weak connections.

Whip up a spreadsheet and establish a cadence for strengthening these relationships.

For peers, it may be a monthly check in.

For mentors, it may be quarterly.

Here's the formula for mentors:

1) Ask for specific advice

2) Actually follow the advice

3) Report back on the result

4) Repeat

The people that respond are now invested in your success.

Congratulations!

You now have a legit network.

I spent the past year following this formula.

And I'm a far-from-perfect 22 year old.

If I can execute on this plan, you can too.

Follow me @chrishlad for more frameworks, systems, stories and the occasional bad joke that you'll never laugh at.

And I'd love if you could retweet the 1st tweet to spread this network building formula!

https://twitter.com/chrishlad/status/1413486657312002048?s=20