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Found a 20 year old Rolodex at an estate sale last month
I've been using LinkedIn and Cold email for years but this old guy's system of hand written index cards with personal notes on each one actually got me 2 meetings last week. Has anyone else tried going analog for networking when digital fails?
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nancy82422d agoMost Upvoted
The Rolodex works because it forces you to be selective and intentional about who you actually follow up with. Cold email blasts are fine for volume but handwritten notes make you slow down and actually think about what that specific person needs. I keep a small stack of index cards on my desk for the 15 people I really want to talk to that month. Write down their name, what they care about, and one thing I can give them. Takes ten minutes but those cards get looked at every morning. The rest of my contacts just sit in a spreadsheet that I barely touch.
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lane.angela22d ago
Why would you go backwards like that when digital tools can track hundreds of contacts at once? A Rolodex is limited to what you can fit on a card and if you lose it you're screwed. Your phone backs up everything automatically and you can search names in seconds. Handwriting notes is slow and messy compared to typing them out in a spreadsheet. Plus those index cards will get coffee stains and torn edges after a year. I'd rather spend those 2 hours sending 200 cold emails than sorting through dusty paper scraps. You got lucky with a couple meetings but that doesn't mean the system works it just means those people were already interested.
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