Going TNW Pro: A Smart Way To Make New Social Media Friends

Think where man's glory most begins and ends, and say my glory was I had such friends. William Butler Yeats

Screenshot of How TNW Pro Member Looks

 The Next Web (TNW)  is a terrific online publication that curates and shares the latest news on technology, business and culture. They have a global reach with about 7.2 million monthly visitors to their site. Visitors come to learn about the latest in internet technology and other hot button news.  So why am I telling you all this? Because TNW offers a great subscription with a fantastic gift attached to it. When you sign up, they offer you a one month free trial and then if you wish to continue, a one year subscription is only $30.

What is the gift? If you look at the frame above, there is a picture of me and my Twitter link. When you sign up with TNW, they offer you your own webpage on their site, and whenever you share a post from the site, your profile is attached and you increase your contact with others and the potential to make new friends. Typically, we send out a link with nothing more and others re-tweet, click or ignore it. With the byline, it draws attention and connections can be made.  How does this work?

Another Look at the Pro Member Image

I was curious how my Pro membership worked when I first read about it and so I explored further.  On their FAQ page, they provided the additional explanation below.

 How do I share as a Pro? Every post on TNW has share buttons for Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn. When you are logged in as a Pro member (you can see if you are by checking the menu bar. If it is yellow and shows ‘PRO’ that means you are logged in) the share buttons contain custom URLs with your unique ID in them. They are shortened using our own tnw.to domain. When you use these sharing buttons to share to Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn you are using the correct URL.

Each time your shared article is clicked on or re-shared your unique ID registers it. Of course, the more hot news we read and share the more others are exposed to it and TNW has a weekly update on the top 20 members who've shared newsy items. So give it a try. Funnily, I was reading another post from the site on 20 Ways to be Awesome on the internet and that post led me to this one. Two things that stood out for me on that post was: Be Useful and Love What you do. Would you be interested in learning about the other 18 points? The audio is below and it's a short and easy to hear recording. Go on, listen and then Go sign up on The Next Web and claim your Pro page.
More Below!

Online Friendships: Meeting A Triiibes Friend Offline...

"And a youth said, Speak to us of Friendship. And he answered saying: Your friend is your needs answered..." Kahlil Gibran

Friendships come in different packages;online, offline, all lines

We meet our friends in all sorts of ways and I love to read or hear about how others met their cherished friends or spouses. Why? Because each story is unique; in a quirky sorta special way. There usually is humor somewhere or an exchange that precipitates more exchanges and then a friendship builds...  With the explosion of the internet, social media and online dating sites, we have all become exposed to other ways to connect with people and make friends and so an online connection can create an opportunity for a lifelong friendship.

When I read MamaKat's assignment for this week's Writers Workshop, I was nicely surprised to see the question about meeting online friends offline. It made me smile and I knew I would write about it on both of my blogs. Sure, we all read terrible tales of people meeting online strangers offline to disastrous outcomes and I am not advocating this as a trend or even a habit.  We must still be attentive to our instincts and our gut feelings about the people we connect with online.



This week's Prompt: That one time you met your online friend in real life (was it everything you thought it would be?)

So far, the few friends I've made online have been through membership in a community; Triiibes, Problogger 31DBBB group and such. Personally, I would not meet strangers without careful review and, in any case, my advice is to keep it social in a public space.

I met Bronwyn on Seth Godin's Triiibes (a private Ning group with 10,000 members, password-protected, non-anonymous where folk gather to discuss/encourage/connect with likeminded souls) and we connected immediately; we shared something in common - we were transplanted from our place of birth to live/work in entirely new countries... Read the rest below.



On yet another note, before you dive into my online/offline friendship story below,  I was the featured blogger via my Wordpress blog - Mirth and Motivation - on SITSGirls on Tuesday; I wrote a piece on 10 Things we can do before sitting down for Thanksgiving Dinner and had a blast responding to all the SITStahs who stopped by to say hello. Thank you all for your comment love and support.  If you missed it, do stop by my other blog and check out the tips; very handy as we approach the holiday season... Read on & Thank you!