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Ask HN: How do you find experts to talk to?

2 points by vijayr ↗ HN
Let's say you want to learn about a topic (or industry etc) and that you want to talk to someone who is working on the topic/industry and ask specific questions. How to find such people, without cold calling/cold emailing and without bothering them? In other words, how to find people who are okay with spending half hour to an hour, willingly?

4 comments

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PaulHoule
Don't be afraid of the "cold call" or "cold email" to the expert, it is very different from the cold call to the customer.

If some professor wrote a paper or book about a subject or got their work mentioned in the media the odds are pretty good you can look up their phone number in a campus directory, have them answer, and ask a question about the paper and typically get 10-15 min to talk. Generally people like that are happy that people are interested in their work and you often get a good response.

vijayr
I did cold email a few people once, but it felt very very uncomfortable. How was your experience?
PaulHoule
I never found it very hard because I spent time in an academic environment where grad students & professors call and write each other all the time. They are not going to research your credential in 15 minute so you don't need an academic affiliation, the fact that you are reading what they write is a good enough connection.

If I have a focused question about their work and have a PMA about it, I would say my success rate is awfully close to 100%, in fact I cannot think of a time where I did not get a thoughtful response.

Anyway, Tim Ferris talks about this in the "4 hour work week" and says pretty much what I told you. It may be intimidating if you are not in the habit, but people who write books and other literature are usually very happy to hear from readers. Getting a whole hour might be tough, but 10-15 min on the phone is not that hard.

frankwiles
I find actually meaningful engagement on Twitter can help ease the "cold call". What is meaningful engagement? It'll depend on the person/industry but something for THEM rather than for YOU.