Yesterday I was the speaker and a delegate at a Speed Networking event. The other attendees included telecoms sales people, hotel marketeers, lawyers, accountants, tax advisers, a VAT specialist, a will writer, a head-hunter, a marketing adviser, a relationship advisor from a high street bank, financial advisers and software sales people – altogether a reasonable cross section of the SME community.
Sitting opposite some 20 different people and listening to their efforts to sell me their services was a very interesting experience.
The first point that was noticeable was how little preparation anyone had done. In other words I often did not get a clear idea of the three basics of any business:
1. what the business does
2. who it’s for
3. what will make prospects buy the product or service
These three points should be the foundations on which every business is built.
The organisers are at pains to tell people how to use the event i.e. “say what you do, why you’re different, why you’re here and what you want,” but only one person told me what they wanted. She wanted me to introduce her to all my customers without giving me a clear idea of how I or my customers would benefit from her company’s services. Talk about one-way traffic!
How Networking Really Works
Networking is about building relationships with people that eventually lead to valuable business exchanges. The key point about networking is that people do business with those they trust, respect and like. It takes time to create that trust, respect and friendship.
Look at it this way – the first time you went out with your current partner, wife or husband, did you expect to ask them to become your partner for life on that first date? No, you probably went out for a considerable period of time before you made the decision that this was someone with whom you wanted to spend the rest of your life.
It is the same with building business relationships – they take time to mature. But when they do mature they tend to have tremendous longevity.
So my view on speed networking is that it is a valuable place to start a new relationship, but don’t expect to walk out of your first meeting with any new business.
The Key to Success is your Follow-up
The real value will come from how you follow up on the contacts you make and how you develop relationships with those people.
I would recommend, as a minimum, planning a series of follow up e-mails in which you highlight the value you can provide in different areas that might be of interest to a prospect. For instance a lawyer might talk about trusts, conveyancing, litigation etc. – a marketing service might talk about research, graphics, copy-writing, response etc. Each should be the subject of a different e-mail.
You will be able to make your follow-up more specific to your target if you spend time at the speed networking event taking a real interest in each person you meet and finding out as much as you can about their interests, needs, desires and concerns.
