Outstanding point of view. The point on having a Ga-Zillion Twitter followers…I couldn’t have said it better. Thanks for being out here.

[...] once in a long while I run into a blog that turns my head and this one written by Chuck Blakeman really put a crick in my neck.  Chuck’s question… Are we wasting our time with [...]

Thanks for a post that makes us think.

I think a few distinctions should be made…

1. Dunbar mainly studied non-humans. His observation of humans was only empirical. He has done no experiments on humans to find out the optimum number (really - how could he? There is no way to manipulate a lot of groups of people and then figure out the magic number.)

2. Also, Dunbar states the magic number to be between 100 to 230. (148 just has a 95% confidence interval - so there is a huge margin of error.)

3. But more than that - Dunbar’s research states that 148 is the number of people “in which an individual knows who each person is, and how each person relates to every other person.”

The part after the comma is important - *and how each person relates to every other person*.

You don’t really need to know how each of your client is related to every other client of yours - do you? Then you can have significant relationship with a lot more than 148 people.

Dunbar clearly states that 150 would be the mean group size only for communities with a *very high incentive to remain together*.

So 150 is the right number for a cult.

But for most others, they can definitely have more than 150 meaningful one-on-one relationships.

Admittedly one can’t have 73,395 meaningful relationships. But I think a 1000 is no problem.

Which brings us to Kevin Kelly. And his theory of a 1000 true fans:

http://www.kk.org/thetechnium/archives/2008/03/1000_true_fans.php

Scot,

Thanks for the feedback. Looking forward to getting to know you better.

Ankesh,

Thanks also for your feedback. A couple thoughts on your post:

We’re talking about two different relationships. Your reference to Kevin Kelly’s “True Fans” is the same as my “Raving Fans”, which I stole much more directly from other authors - Kevin had the common sense to change the description a little.

Raving Fans are a subset of Strategic Alliance Partners (in my little world.) As Kevin Kelly describes them (and I would say the same), a Raving Fan is ONE BUYER who is committed to buying from you regularly. A Strategic Alliance Partner is someone who regularly sends you new buyers - every week, month, quarter. In the digital world of eCommerce, an Alliance Partner could be someone who links directly to your business and starts sending you 10 clients a day (and you to them).

Would you rather have one alliance partner who sends you 3,500 customers a year, or 1,000 True Fans? Don’t answer - it’s a trick question. You’d rather have both. Find a Strategic Alliance Partner who sends you a lot of clients, then turn as many of those clients into Raving (True) Fans by exceeding their expectations and creating credibility, community (tribe), consistency, and incredulity with them (knock their socks off).

FYI - Most people use Dunbar’s “150″ as someone you would feel comfortable walking across a bar and joining for a drink. My question to you - Do you really know more than a one or two social freaks who could do that with 1,000 people (I don’t know anyone)? Anyone with that kind of capacity doesn’t need to read this blog - they should be stinking rich already via those relationships.

Also, as a many people pointed out, Kevin Kelly’s economics for “1,000 True Fans” doesn’t work. As with most artists, he forgets that $100 in sales is $10-$30 in his pocket. 1,000 close friends becomes 3,000-4,000 real quick. The best way to get those 3,000-4,000 Raving Fans is to find as many of them as possible through a few strategic gateopeners.

I came across this supporting quote in Godin’s new book, Tribes and couldn’t resist posting it:

“Showing up isn’t sufficient. Friending ten or twenty or a thousand people in Facebook might be good for your ego but it has zero to do with any useful measure of success.”

page 59, from the section titled Participating Isn’t Leading

Really great post. Ironically I found your blog through twitter I have really been enjoying reading it. I really appreciate your insight, and it has been helping me to question, re-think, and focus myself in my own business. Thank you!

Thanks Chuck.

I agree with you on your distinction between raving fans and strategic alliances.

What I had a problem with was this line in your post “While 148.7 is the *maximum number* of social relationships we can have, almost none of us are taking advantage of this relational capacity to grow our business.”

148.7 is nowhere near the maximum.

I know quite a few folks actually who have a network bigger than 150 people.

I personally am not a born networker. Networking doesn’t come easy to me. And so have spent a lot of time trying to become a better networker.

May I suggest you (and others reading this comment) study how Joe Girard maintained relationships with folks? Or even better, study someone introverted who became very popular because of her relationship building skills - princess Diana.

Another small distinction - imho - strategic partners make a subset of raving fans. Not the other way around.

The 12 stages of relationship building makes for some interesting reading (scroll a bit):
http://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/?ShowMe=ThisMemo&MemoID=1789

A strategic partner who is not already a raving fan won’t make for a very good strategic partner.

Chuck,

You’ve got a point - no use in linking, or friending etc. with too many people just for the sake of it.

I can see a couple of reasons why a networker would want to collect as many contacts as possible (beyond the sheer compulsion):

- she wants to create a ‘hive’ (dixit Seth Godin) in order to be able to generate a buzz at a certain point of time in the future (launch of new product etc.)
- she wants to create your own online community(for example on Ning)
- she needs as many people as possible to pass on a specific request (charity, missing, expertise) or question - see LinkedIn Answers.

Since the power is in the links, not in the nodes, these are examples of a valid strategy. But I do agree with you : no one can pretend to be really “friend” or “connected” beyond his/her own tribe.

Pierre

Ankesh,

Now we are still talking about Twitter here arn’t we? And the issue here is still Social Networking and Twitter being worth it for that tool, isn’t it?

In real life I can effectively associate with maybe 200 people on a regular basis, I have over 2000 real people I know from my work in networking for over 30 years, but Twitter is full of too many ‘Non-Humans’ that a human cannot visualize or rationalize with a non-human. This makes effectively associating with more than a 100 Twitters on a regular basis very hard to do, if not impossible to do.
The reason most people on Twitter are striving for the higher numbers is to heighten their popularity amongst a cult or a Tribe they are chief of. A newbie to Twitter would see that this person have 70k followers and conclude they “must be somebody to know’ and they jump off the cliff to follow them. For those millions out there who are only out for the thrill ride of the internet, that is the game they want to play. It has no social implications what so ever…just a game.
In another group of Twitter Users I was told that “if you do not have over 7k followers and following over 10k you are a Loser”. Doesn’t that tell you the type of people who are playing this game.
These people (or in some cases non-humans) who go for those higher number of followers/following are only out for themselves and could care little about associating with any number of their followers, thus is what causes the noise every one calls the Ga-Zillion posts made on Twitter and will be what brings Twitter down over time.
Noise filters like Tweetdeck are the only way to make any sense out of Twitter or bring it into a scope of it being a Networking tool.
Going for quality with knowing just a few hundred people to associate with socially online is much better than playing a mind numbing game. Life is way to short for that..

Lea,
Great comment – finding me on Twitter – that is exactly why we should make contact with as many people as practical. Then we need to take it to the next level and turn the “contact” into a “connection”.

Pierre,
Just great comments – couldn’t have said it better myself or I would have (but you did)! These are great reasons to go wide, but it always comes back to converting the contact to a connection and building that Raving Fan who sticks with you and promotes you to others.

Scot,

Great thoughts - It’s simple multiplication. Find a bunch of people through one vs. trying to find many through many. No different than in sales – would I rather sell $10 of product to 1,000 people or $10,000 to one? Gateopeners are huge for most businesses.

Ankesh,

Sounds like we just have a different view of “social relationships”. I have thousands of contacts via Twitter, LinkedIn, and a local weekly lunch I’ve been doing for two years (800 alumni of this alone), but I would not characterize very many of them as social relationships. That is the overextension of the “social networking” that this blog is about.

I am very loyal to some bloggers and business experts who don’t know I exist – to me that is not a social relationship but an “information” or even “commercial” relationship. Social relationships (my definition) require ongoing, two-way communication, give-and-take and relationship building. These are the people who will be my Raving Fans and who will send me their tribes.

But as my blog post said – build as big and wide a network as you can. Just know that the masses will buy one at a time (even if ongoing), and a gateopener can send me tens, hundreds or even thousands at once.

Case in point – would an author rather build a following via Twitter or have Oprah spend 10 minutes with her in front of millions and plug her book? Again, both (but Oprah if I had to choose – easy choice). But I’m on Twitter not just because it casts a wide net and I might get clients from that wide net, but I also believe there are a few Oprah’s for my business in the crowd and I can be their Oprah, too.

Oprah doesn’t let you on the show because you chatted on Twitter a couple times, but because you have developed a true social relationship with her – she knows you, she believes in you. That isn’t a digital conversation or two, but an intentional ongoing relationship that creates a gate opener (strategic alliance) out of a contact.

The comments in this blog are very good. I admire the hob-nob inclined.

Funny how we have so much freedom that we can own our own business in the United States but with that freedom we pretty much lose the freedom to be an introvert.

Today, a business owner can live in a cabin in Alaska and succeed it is just a little different than one who participates in the big city. Mostly the difference is in income.

An excellent article on Introverts for those who’re interested:
http://www.mcdonaldwordsmith.com/Miss_Communications2.html

Thanks, Chuck. THis has made for some very iteresting reading and some good thoughts. As with anything, I think there has to be a balance. So, social networking should be a part of your plan, but not all of it. We’ve come a long way from the days when you had to have LOTS of money to advertise if you were going to make a presence.

I do believe that you can build trust, establish yourself as an expert and become a familiar name to many, many people. THink Coca-Cola. The more you become known (albeit superficially), the more people feel that they can trust you, recommend you and use your services if they need them. Which comes right back to your example of strategic alliances and raving fans!
THanks for a great post. See you on Tues at the meeting

I too stumbled across you via Twitter. I’m new to Twitter and at the moment really just enjoying the game (it is in fact fun!) but am also more seriously exploring how all of this is shaping human relationships so thanks for your great post and to all the thoughtful commenters.
The discussion around 150 people shed some new light on Malcom Gladwell’s use of that “statistic” in *The Tipping Point*