Although man’s desire to communicate – or chat – has not changed, the way that we do it certainly has. Cave painters of old are now the meme’rs and bloggers of today. Long gone are hand-written notes carried on horseback and sealed with an ironclad secure silk ribbon and wax combo, for today we can chat and instant message with our betrothed … or the pizza guy, the cutie you met at the bar or a co-worker!
Smartphone and desktop chat apps were created for instantly connecting with someone, for sharing information quickly and for checking in. They are free and amazing for short interactions, 24/7, from just about anywhere in the world. The truth is though that chat apps were never intended as the go-to platform for communicating massive amounts of detail, and this my friends is a real life saver for some personality types! How about yours?
Take this quick test to rate your chat personality. Give yourself one (1) point every time you answer NO to the following questions:
- Do you chat as if you were speaking face-to-face?
- Do you start with greetings and salutations, and end the chat that way?
- Do you ask if someone is free or available first before barrelling right in?
- Do you use a maximum of one acronym or abbreviation per sentence?
- When you use sarcasm, do you always add a smiley face or type out ‘hehe’?
If you answered ‘no’ to two or more questions above then your chat personality probably needs some tweaking! Here’s the situation in a nutshell:
- Traditional human interaction is different to communicating in today’s virtual age, yet there aren’t many classes teaching us how to adapt.
- Face-to-face is obviously the king of communication because you can register the emotions on a person’s face, hear the tone in their voice, note their body language – well, and smell them too but let’s hope that’s always a pleasant bonus!
- Traditional phone calls are also a fantastic way to chat, unless you are Sheldon Cooper and can’t perceive the nuances of emotion and sarcasm simply by listening to someone. When someone is smiling on the other end of the phone, generally speaking the average human can tell.
- Chat is the most convenient form of communication around today! However, aside from some emoticons, it doesn’t allow for much of one’s ‘personality’ to come across, so extra effort is needed.
Being more personable and likeable on chat isn’t rocket science and you can quickly improve your style by following these simple Golden Rules:
- Remember you are chatting WITH someone not AT them. The easiest way to do this is to communicate like you would in person. Sure it takes more time to type ‘OK that sounds great’ instead of just ‘OK’ but the feeling behind your words will be better understood if you spend the extra few seconds!
- Always greet the person you are chatting with! It sounds simple and straightforward but you’d be surprised how many people forget to simply say ‘Hey, Angela’ and just start asking questions or shooting over instructions.
- Ask if someone is free before you start on a big chat message if you are expecting an instantaneous reply. There’s nothing more annoying than a friend or colleague who can see that you are online so they just start typing away, then type more asking asking why you aren’t replying, then get annoyed at YOU because they think you are now disrespecting or ignoring them … PHEWWW! Just ask first, it really saves time and energy.
- Not everyone is versed in the latest vocabulary for snappy chatters so keep the abbreviations and acronyms to a minimum. Throwing in an LOL or leaving off the ‘e’ in the word ‘maybe’ from time to time is cool but it’s really annoying to have to interpret someone’s chat messages. Save that for your BFF who you share a secretly modified pig Latin language with {insert wink here}!
- …and speaking of winks! Remember that jokes and humor are hard to detect on chat messages so it’s safer to use an emoticon or LOL or hehe to ensure that the person you are chatting with knows that you weren’t being snarky. They can’t see your smile via chat, so you have to communicate it.
All in all, chat rocks! It’s free from Voxox, convenient and the best thing to come along since sliced bread … so be someone that people love to chat with by following a few new best practices today.
