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Conversation underpins networking….When you say networking, people cringe as it’s a term that people immediately associate with having to approach people and sell their business, and ironically this is where it all goes wrong….
Imagine you are at an event, someone approaches you and immediately launches into promoting their service or product. They then give you their card and waltz off to find someone else and you are left wondering who they are.
Exactly, it doesn’t work does it, so you shouldn’t do it either. Networking isn’t purely about selling your business, it’s about conversation.
It’s about asking someone what they do and what brought them to the event, in return they should ask about you and your business (.. if they don’t converse with you, then move on to the next!)….if the conversation flows you can exchange knowledge, ideas, contacts and explore ways to work together.
Networking is a valuable way to build relationships with people through conversation. It shouldn’t be a purpose driven with specific objectives to hand out as many business cards as possible; in fact it’s the opposite. Your purpose should be focussed on talking to a fewer number of people in more depth, establishing rapport and building good relationships; the outcomes will be much greater.
Of course, it is likely that you will go to events with an intention to meet individuals working in certain areas, e.g. you may need a book keeper, or you might want to partner with some on running events? To ensure you meet the right people make sure you approach the network leaders and tell them who you’d like to meet. This way they can introduce you to the right people, which will add significant value to your networking experience.
Through Striding Out we regularly connect and introduce people at networking events and we have seen business relationships and partnerships form as a result.
Best Wishes
Heather Business Coach and Founder of www.stridingout.co.uk |
Archive for March, 2007
The Art of Conversation
NUMBER ONE IN GOOGLE? WHY?
There’s a large number of companies that provide ways for your website to rank highly in search results. As I’ve mentioned before, many of them are run by dedicated, highly experienced technicians who deliver what they promise, albeit at a price. There are also snake-oil salesmen who will deliver a high ranking for search terms that are only typed in once every few days (usually by you, to check if your site is still number one). What if you didn’t need to be “number one in Google”? What if your customers all came to your site in another way? Could it be possible? Well, of course it is. Why not liberate yourself from the “Search Engine Optimisation Industry”? Here are some ways to do just that –
- You’re reading this, aren’t you? If you have a regular, useful ezine, people will use the links to visit your website from time to time.
- Have a feature on your site that asks visitors to register what they need, and alert them when you can supply it
- Make sure you mention your website at every opportunity
- Encourage other website owners to link to you (but no tacky “link farming”,please)
- Set up an affiliate programme
You can think of more. Drop me a line if you have any that you’d like to share. Join the revolution! Liberate your site from the search engines
By Alan Stevens, Founder of www.mediacoach.co.uk
Reinforcing Online Connections
When you say online connections, immediately you think of myspace, facebook, bebo etc, but this time I’m not talking about social media, I’m talking about websites….it’s back to basics.
With every client you work with, partnership you create, stakeholders you engage with, you should look to create a relationship which can be turned into a future business opportunity. All you need to do is ask if you can exchange links and a paragraph of text to represent your business on each others website. This exchange could be purely on a voluntary basis or if you want to take it a step further you could use an affiliate programme, where you give the referrer a % of income created.
The paragraph about your business needs to be short and sweet, capturing people’s attention so they want to find out more. The paragraph could be in the form of a testimonial or a description of services, followed by your weblink. This exchange will not only be a great promotional opportunity for both of you, but it also boost your reputation in terms of who you work with, and it will also boost your rankings on search engines such as google. Overall it will have a positive impact on your marketing and PR strategy.
Measuring the impact of your website referrals is easy; you just need to use online measuring tools such as Google analytics.
One great example of this relationship is where www.stridingout.co.uk has worked with www.beunpackaged.com. Unpackaged was one of Striding Out’s participants on Big Leap Competition, and our recent promotion of the competition led to a press feature on the www.treehugger.com website. The feature directed people to Cath’s website, which in turn referred people to our site from a weblink on the Be Unpackaged website.
So every month reflect on who you’ve worked with and see how you can reinforce your online connection with them. The positive impact will not only strengthen your existing business relationships but also your new ones, as referrals from trusted sources are always best.
Best Wishes
Heather
Founder and Business Coach www.stridingout.co.uk
Running a Business In Second Life
Striding Out Member, Simon Stevens, shares his 10 Tips to running a business in Secondlife.
Secondlife is a popular and ever-growing virtual world where real businesses are beginning to explore it as a real potential for promotion and income generation. But running a business in Second Life is not as straight forward as its looks. I run my own nightclub for many months and here are my top ten tips….
- Always remember Secondlife is not a game and take it as serious as any other business venture.
- Do not assume your real life business venture will automatically work in Secondlife.
- Spend time in secondlife understanding the culture and norms before starting a business.
- Network and add as many friends as you can, you must get known.
- If you do not know how to do something, ask, it is a friendly space.
- If you can’t do it yourself, pay someone else to do it.
- Remember everything costs a fraction of what it is in the real world.
- Expect to be having business meetings in the middle of the night!.
- Don’t assume you are the “first ……” because you are probably not!.
- Always expect the unexpected including having a business meeting with a fox, dragon or octopus!.
Sounds crazy? Have a look yourself!.
www.secondlife.com www.simonstevens.com www.enableenterprises.com
