networking event

Why the Death of the Business Card has been Widely Misreported

March 12, 2012

A couple of weeks ago an article in Bloomberg Businessweek asked how business cards survive in the ‘Age of LinkedIn’. The article’s author, Roger Bennett, quoted Mo Koyfman of Spark Capital describing business cards as “so horse-and-carriage”. He went on to describe the range of technological innovation designed to commit physical business cards to the annals of history, including ‘Bumping’ smart phones, applications that share virtual cards and LinkedIn itself.

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What if your dream client were in the room?

February 21, 2012

Sometimes I meet people and I wonder would they dress as they do, say what they do, act as they do, if their dream client were in the room. Now I’m not saying that we shouldn’t ever relax, or spend our whole lives pretending, but when we are working we are – well working!  And, if we are working, shouldn’t we doing our best all of the time and not just when in sight of our best client, or prospective best client?

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Don’t be afraid to tell your network what you charge

February 20, 2012

Quite often the cost of your services can stop you getting referred but not in the way that you probably think. You do not need to alter your costs or become cheaper to get referred more often. You’ll rarely hear people say: “I can’t refer him or her as they are too expensive.” It is not what you cost that stops people recommending you: it is not knowing what you cost that stops people referring you.

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Why People Do Not Make Networking Work

February 5, 2012

With so many people networking, you’d think the whole level of networking has collectively risen to a pretty high standard. You’d think there are lots of people achieving their business goals and making good money from networking. But I’m very sceptical of how successful people are from their networking. Let’s explore. There are many ways to measure success with networking. I’m talking new relationships, business opportunities, referral partners, sourcing new suppliers and resources, support and encouragement, sounding boards for ideas, staff recruitment and so on. But can we talk cold hard cash for a moment? How much money do you [...]

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The importance of the introduction in online social networking

January 2, 2012

Have you ever been to a face to face networking event where everyone was silent, where no-one spoke to you and you didn’t speak to them; where you didn’t even exchange a ‘hello’ and a ‘what brings you here?’ conversation.  I haven’t and I suspect that if you did, you’d be disillusioned with the networking scene pretty quickly.  After all the whole point of business networking is to meet and talk to people so you can find those you would like to build strong working relationships with, isn’t it?

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KIT

December 19, 2011

No this isn’t a blog about David Hasselhoff in the 80’s TV series Knight Rider, and his talking car KIT, it’s about ‘Keeping In Touch’ (KIT). Keeping in touch with clients is so vitally important to your success in business that I really can’t stress it enough. So, if you don’t have a system for keeping in touch at the moment, please put one in place right now.

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Word of Mouth Marketing

December 15, 2011

“Word of Mouth Marketing “is it new? Just think about this for a second. How did we get business before we had print or before people could read or write. Newspapers although quite old only really started in the late 1800’s. Solicitors were only allowed to start advertising in the UK in 1984 so how did they get business before then? They Networked. They networked very well and networking is part of a “word of mouth” marketing strategy which is a fantastic way to get you the business that you want. For those of you who have not done any [...]

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What’s business networking got to do with fishing?

November 16, 2011

Imagine, if you will, a fishing boat out in the North Sea. The bulging fishing net is being hoisted out of the water, full of fish.  And as the droplets of water run down to the bottom of the net, they drip into a steaming hot cup of coffee. What? Let me explain.  This is a revolutionary way of looking at networking given to me by the ever-excellent Andy Bounds*, which, while it sounds wacky, is a great analogy on networking events.

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