About five years ago, city and statewide networking events were all the rage. We here at eQ actually built a concentrated sales strategy around attending them. We had two support staffers research every happy hour, committee meeting, holiday party, and fundraising benefit in a 100 mile radius and then we would divvy the tickets up among our three top salespeople and send them off with boxes of their business cards.
We shook a lot of hands, collected a lot of contact information, and drank many a cocktail but in the end we converted very little of our efforts into new sales. The activity was not measuring up to achievement.
Rather than demand a refund from every host, we decided to return to our corporate values instead and “grow regardless,” meaning we’d at least learn a lesson. And we did - that eQ earns most of its business through tending its network as opposed to attending networking events.
A while back, eQ published an article called “You Are the Company You Keep” in which we discussed why it is that 20% of a company’s workforce usually generates 80% of a company’s revenue. It’s because these “twenty percenters” nurture their network and cultivate their relationships. They give freely to their contacts. Their air is one of abundance without an agenda. In due course, when these people they know are then presented with an opportunity to hand out a referral or find that they need a certain product or service themselves, guess who’s at the front of their mind? The twenty percenter! Read more about this phenomenon in our article that was published in SmartCEO Magazine at this link: http://www.entrequest.com/wp-content/pdf/SalesQuest.12.05.pdf?phpMyAdmin=d2c4aa6766ft5760658.
In terms of the company you are currently keeping, you have one of the best networking tools literally at your fingertips – the social network! And we’re not talking about the Oscar-nominated film. Social media sites, particularly Facebook and LinkedIn, might still be a mystery when it comes to converting connections into clients but they afford all of us the easiest and fastest means of staying on top of our contact’s lives. In an instant, you can see what books someone is reading, movies someone enjoys watching, news items someone is interested in, and jokes someone thinks are funny. When you connect with what your connection is saying, you can jump right into their conversation with your two-say. Your interest in their material alone is a complement to them. And please note, it’s NOT stalking if you’re reading and commenting on information and pictures that are publicly posted so don’t feel awkward paging through profiles.
The one caution here is that you have to be genuine while cultivating your social network. If you give the thumbs-up to everything posted on your Facebook newsfeed, then you become “that annoying friend who should get a life.” If you start posting updates on every action you’re doing from deciding which variety of bagel you want for breakfast to what's going through your mind during every commercial break of "The Bachelor," then you become “that annoying friend I just de-friended.”
Take note of what is going on in your network because you are the company that you keep. Share in the joys of your partners, show sympathy when you peers post sad news, and let someone know you laughed out loud when they passed a hilarious link along. You don’t have to do it publically on Facebook. In fact, we recommend you use social networks as a platform that will give you a reason to pick up the phone and reach out to someone or give you an opening line to start a conversation the next time you see that someone face-to-face.
Twenty percenters are attuned to their social surroundings and accordingly act in abundance. They know their network and in turn, their network knows them. Hence why they’re usually the ones behind 80% of the business.
Joe Mechlinski is the President of entreQuest and has partnered with countless leaders to effectively improve their team’s performance, their clients’ experience, and their company’s profits.