Helping you become better at networking

Namer, a new professional networking product, is coming soon from us. Read on to learn more about the thinking behind it and sign up to be notified when it's live at https://namer.is

Networking is the lifeblood of success, but in a world where everyone is connected all the time, we've lost the human touch that makes it meaningful. We've become overwhelmed by the endless flood of messages, requests, and notifications, and lost track of the people that matter most. But what if there was a better way?

The world used to be much simpler, and harder at the same time. When you wanted to reach someone, you had to call them and hope that they would be available at that exact time, and usually there was a requirement that you knew the person beforehand, or at least got a friendly introduction. Networking took a lot of work, but the rules were simple: reach out, maintain your rolodex and repeat.

Technology was supposed to make things easier, and it did. Email made it possible to send instantaneous messages across the world, and then came Yahoo Messenger, SMS, WhatsApp and the list goes on. All these tools are fantastic for keeping in touch, but they also lowered the threshold for interacting with anyone in the world, at any time.

The problem with low friction instantaneous communication is that it’s so easy that everyone started doing it all the time. That put the burden on the receiving party to deal with the inflow and risk becoming too reactionary as a result. To add insult to injury, products like LinkedIn removed all friction to “connect” and we all started connecting like crazy until we realized one day that we had thousands of connections, many of whom we don’t even know, further exacerbating the problem.

We are all connected, all the time, but lost the human touch in the process.

With Namer, we want to address this.

But just to be clear, we are not trying to boil the ocean. We’ve conducted dozens of user interviews, mocked up all sorts of interaction patterns and mapped out how people manage their network today, and most importantly how they would want to manage it. Based on that, we’re starting with a few simple core values:

• Focused and task oriented. Simply offering a list of people you are somehow connected with, a feed and a messaging tool isn’t networking. We believe networking is about context and focus, helping you achieve meaningful tasks that will enhance your network in a productive manner.

• Watering your network over time. No two professional connections are the same, and it takes time to nurture them. We want to grow with your needs to cover the bases and then expand, but in a way that helps you and your network be productive in the long run.

• It’s all about people! Last but absolutely not least, networking is about people connecting, and doing so in a meaningful manner. Namer is all about helping you connect and interact with the people that matter to you at any given time, whether that’s preparing for an interaction, following up, staying in touch or even finding new and meaningful connection.

With these in minds, we’re picking a simple starting point: familiarize yourself with the people you’re about to meet next week.

Any of us who have more than a few repeating meetings each week are familiar with the dreading feeling of going between back-to-back meetings, and wondering “Who am I meeting next?” and even sometimes “Why and when did I schedule this?”

Namer makes this easier by combining information from your calendar and your contacts, and offering a simple focused experience where you can prepare yourself for who you are meeting next week. All meetings have topics and agendas, but the human connection often gets lost in the mix, and we want to solve that.

If this sounds interesting to you, and you’d like to hear about future updates to our product, head to the Namer website and sign up for the waiting list. The product is launching soon and we will let you know when it’s live so you can take it for a spin.

Happy networking!