Social media allows us to discover, connect, and engage with new people of interest.

While most people are open to new connections and receiving messages from people they don’t know, there is a fine line between reaching out and “spamming.” The challenge is to make a connection clearly and effectively without wasting people’s time.

Soren Gordhamer, organizer of the Wisdom 2.0 Conference which brings together staff from Google, Facebook, and Twitter, outlines seven key lessons for improving your social networking skills in this Mashable post - 7 Lessons for Better Networking with Social Media.