LESSONS: 3 People You Need to Ignore Online

Here are 3 people to stay away from:

1. The Spectator

Do you know who the football coach never invites into the locker room for some advice during halftime? The spectators. The wide receiver never runs into the stand and asks for feedback from someone sitting in the 10th row.
Why? Because spectators aren’t on the field. They aren’t playing. They’re watching other people do it.
What does that mean for you? It means you need to ignore the person who hates your blog but doesn’t have their own. They’re just a spectator. Their hands aren’t dirty. Their knowledge has not been paid for with experience. Ignore them. Instead, get feedback from other bloggers, other people who are in the trenches where you are.
2. The Hater

It’s time to require the “squeaky wheel gets the oil” theory. For years it caused many of us to ignore the people who liked our dream in order to focus our energy on the people who hated it. (I call this theory, “Critic’s Math,” which is “1 insult + 1,000 compliments = 1 insult.” We have the ability to receive 1,000 compliments and ignore them in the face of 1 insult.)
The truth is, you should never waste time trying to turn someone who hates you into someone who likes you. Instead focus on turning people who like your dream into people who love your dream.
So how do you know who a hater is? Simple, someone who hates on something without a solution to make it better is a hater. If they don’t have a fix, an idea, a spark of improvement, they’re just there to hate. That’s one of the main differences between hate and feedback.
Feedback’s goal is to cause improvements. Hate’s goal is to cause wounds. Let them go.
3. The Complainer

A complainer is someone who won’t respond when you attempt to fix a problem. For example, let’s say you strongly disagree with something I wrote on my blog and I ask you a clarifying question. If you don’t respond, you’re a complainer.
If you respond, you’re a conversationalist and we can talk. That’s completely different. We can debate. We can go back and forth until we might even reach a resolution. That’s the beauty of the Internet, a simple question can clarify so many of the nuances that can be misinterpreted.