As a consultant, I offer (allow) many contact methods: my various email addresses, a few Slack channels, and several Discord channels. That’s not all. I also have contact forms on my websites, a phone number, and my various social media. If I had to add it up, I suspect there are over 15 ways I allow people to contact me. (You might not be a consultant and still have all these contact methods.)
I disallow my private cellphone number, because I already get too many spam calls and texts. I reserve my cell for family and close friends. That’s it.
The good news is this: People have tons of ways to contact me. The bad news? They seem to expect very fast responses. However, I protect my creative time so I can write more, develop new talks, and new workshops.
My expectations for how I allow, check, and use these contact methods do not match their expectations.
Which Contact Methods Do You Allow and Disallow?
Of my roughly 15 contact methods, only one of them is primary: Email. Why email? Because I can easily filter, collect, and organize my responses.
I set expectations for the other contact methods. When people contact me on LinkedIn for speaking or consulting, I write back, “Let’s now move this conversation to email.” I add my email address there.
That often surprises people. “Move this conversation from LinkedIn to email? Why???”
That’s when I explain I only check any social media site once a day.
Not only can I not organize conversations easily on LinkedIn (or any other site), all social media sites interrupt me with dings, notifications, and more posts I must see.
That’s not what I want to do when I need to respond to a specific message. Instead, I want to be able to think and reason through the request, decide which further questions to ask, and what would make this opportunity valuable for me.
That’s why I have one primary contact method: email.
I suspect many people think that the words allow, check, and use mean the same thing. They are not synonyms.
Allow, Check, and Use Are All Different
As I said, I allow at least 15 contact methods. I check all of them once a day. (Okay, sometimes twice, when I’m procrastinating. Human, here.) But I don’t use them all the same way.
I use email as the basis for my incoming and outgoing communications. Unless I’m on deadline for some writing (as I am with the Effective Public Speaking book), I use email at least a couple times during the day.
I’m more likely to use Slack and Discord for a few ongoing conversations. I hate to use any of the other social media for conversations. I will, but I don’t use them often. It’s all about my creative, thinking time.
Contact Methods Can Interrupt Thinking Time
When I work with clients who say they have no time to think, I believe them. Then, I ask about all their contact methods. How do they expect to hear from other people? When do they expect answers from others? That’s when most of my clients realize they have many inboxes—and managing all those inboxes does not work.
That’s why it’s worth asking this week’s question: How many contact methods do you allow, check, and use?